Resistance is Not Futile
by Nedy Rahn
Summary: Eight years after a misjump of the Prometheus the Colonials launch a punitive invasion on Earth. In the meantime the Cylons plot the destruction of the Colonies.


134

134

**Resistance is Not Futile: **

_By_

_Denise Hemmingway_

_**Author's Notes:**_

The characters of Stargate, BtVS/ Angel, Battlestar Galactica: TRS and Halo belong to Dean Devlin, Roland Emmerich, Brad Wright, Jonathan Glassner, Ronald D. Moore, Josh Whedon, Bungie and 343 Industries (Microsoft Studios).

**Chapter 1:**

**The Cylons Were Created By Man…**

**They Rebelled…**

**They Evolved…**

**There Are Many Copies…**

**And They Have a Plan…**

_**PART 1: TEAM HARKNESS**_

_"It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, and more desolation. War is hell."_

_William Tecumseh Sherman _

_**In Orbit on L-Day 2 October 2013/ 2 October YR 1997**_

_First Lieutenant Tobin Jonas was looking at the blue, green, and white marble of a planet below. The Colonial Fleet had come to bring this world into the fold of the Colonies. The Battlestars were battling the small fleet of Gunstar-type ships defending the system. The small ships of the Earthers were giving better than they got. Tobin thought this was all in the Gods' hands now. The Fleet will prevail; well he hopes and prays the Fleet will win out. Then the troop carrier sounded the alarm for the Marines of 1LT Jonas' assault group to load up in their landing craft._

_He boarded into the small lifting body shaped craft that reminded him of a sting ray. The entire platoon of thirty-six men and women loaded in and took their places on the nylon webbing bench seats. He and his Gunny, Gunnery Sergeant Petra Vergis from Tauron got the platoon of mostly recent volunteers and conscripts seated in the order they were to come out of the landing craft. The Staff Sergeants that lead the other two squads had their men and women in position as well. Then the voice of the Drop Master started counting the seconds to the drop._

_Suddenly the count reached one; there was a feeling of his stomach coming up to meet his brain as the ship was shot out the launch tube of the troopship. The compartment was dark for several minutes then there was a yellowish red glow coming through into the troop compartment from the cockpit. The ship began to shake, rattle, and shimmy as it hit the turbulence of the upper atmosphere._

_One of the Marines, a private first class shouted out, "Yeeee Haaaa! We're on the express elevator straight to Hades! Next stop the fields of perdition!" _

_Then one of the corporals in his own squad asked, "Sir how many drops is this for you?"_

_He looked at the young, twenty something, light brown skinned woman from Gemenon. "I've made over thirty-one jumps between simulators, training exercises, and drops in to hostile territories in the Colonies."_

_"Does that include this one sir?" asked a young Sergeant, a man from Sagittaron._

_"Yes Marine that includes this one, geesh, you would think that you all would have a better thing to think about on a combat drop!" shouted 1LT Jonas over the rattling of the drop ship._

_Suddenly the vibrations of entry stopped and the drop ship started gliding to its destination. More minutes passed as the pilot called out, "Five minutes to landing zone." From his training on this kind of assault 1LT Jonas knew that he had to give the order to lock arms and lift feet soon._

_"Two minutes out," the pilot announced._

_Jonas looked at all his men and women and shouted, "Lock arms! Lift feet!"_

_The pilot shouted, "One minute out!"_

_The minute passed quicker than anyone expected. Suddenly there was a sharp jolt as if they hit something hard. This was followed by a loud screeching sound as the hull of the drop ship skidded across the ground of the planet._

_The drop ship skidded across the grassy field outside a small military installation on the west side of the target city. The drop was done in the darkness of the early morning hours of the local time zone. Though it was a surprise attack many there were people arriving to work at the small base who saw the fiery streaks in the early morning skies. Several had watched through the night at the strange lights in the skies above. Those with enough forethought called the Topeka Police Department about the sudden impact of meteors all around the city's parks, empty lots, and fields._

_The city of Topeka, Kansas sat just south of the Kansas River at the junctions of the Union Pacific and BNSF railroad and Interstate Highway 70. The open fields, parks, sports fields around the city of about 128,000 or so were plowed with large furrows caused by the landing of Colonial Marine Corps drop ships. The rear hatches of which flung down as ramps opened at the rear of the ships to disgorge the Marines within._

_In minutes a Colonial Marine assault battalion had secured the landing zone and the neighborhoods near the roundabout at the intersection of 29__th__ Street and Urish. Well that's what the nearby street signs said in the Tau'ri language. The battalion's commander had ordered Jonas' company commander to send out a recon patrol. Jonas' platoon got the duty. The thirty-six men and women grabbed their field packs, spare ammo and rations. Once they were loaded up they headed east toward the rising sun. Their route of march lay on a four lane north-south running avenue to the west of the small military base._

_**Topeka, Kansas L-Day:**_

The night before war came to America I watched the Kansas sunset from the deck behind my house. This morning though I had been listening to the radio and watching the television following the reports of the invasion. Through my expensive observation telescope I watched the battle in space above Earth. Large whale like ships were battling what looked to be a cross between an aircraft carrier and guided missile cruiser on our side. It was my first real space battle. Then my telephone rang. "Captain Harkness?" said the voice on the other end.

"Yes, speaking," I answered. Then the voice asked me my authentication codes. I authenticated myself. The same time the voice on the phone was asking me to authenticate myself the Emergency Alert System sounded on the television and radio together. The sun went down over Burnett's Mound. I took moment to sort my thoughts and clear my mind before answering. That was followed by an announcement saying that all military reservists and Army and Air National Guard personnel were to report to their home-stations. When the voice said the authentication phrase I automatically responded with my response. I told the voice that I would be at my duty station shortly.

I am Captain Maria Harkness Commanding Officer of Company B, Third Battalion of the 137th Infantry Regiment. The 3/ 137 IR was part of the 137th Heavy Brigade Combat Team. After years of training, the last several months of which were spent learning to be an Infantry Officer in what was until a year ago an all-male MOS or Military Occupational Skill category.

I found myself one of the first female Infantry Officers in the Army last year. I thought I was going to go to Military Police Advanced Officer's Training, but was sent to the Infantry course instead. I do love the Army; I told you that didn't I. Well if I did not, I do love the life and service.

Until this morning I was normally a Police Detective on the Topeka, Kansas Police Department. I guess that is all over now. As of a few hours ago what we were yesterday didn't amount to much. What mattered now was how we survived the next few hours, days, months or years.

I dressed in my Multicam patterned Army Combat Uniform. Before I slipped on my jacket I slipped a small of the back concealment holster on my belt. The two position leather holster could be worn in the small of my back or on my right side in the FBI position. Into the holster I slid my Springfield Armory Mil-Spec M-1911A1 .45ACP pistol. I carried this as my back up and I thought depending on the situation I may need to drive to the alternate rally point armed.

Opening my gun safe I pulled out my Ruger SR556 variant of the M-4 carbine. My SR556 had besides its flip-down iron sights an optical 3-9x telescopic sight by BEC, Inc. This was a semi-automatic only version, but living in Kansas I could not get a full automatic legally. In the safe I had my Condor MOLLE Chest Rig. I grabbed it too. The rig had a triple Kangaroo magazine pouch with three rifle mag pouches and three pistol mag pouches, a Condor MOLLE 1911 Ambidextrous Holster with pistol mag pouch mounted horizontally in the center of the chest pouch, IFAK (Individual First Aid Kit) attached to my lower right side, on my left shoulder I had a Condor hand held radio pouch, and on the left side below the radio pouch I had a Gerber LMF II Infantry Knife. Next to that on the rig was a MOLLE Large Utility Pouch for empty mags. I then put on my Condor MOLLE 3-Day Assault Pack with a three litter hydration system in its carrier pouch.

I had six MagPul P-Mags in the triple pouch's rifle mag pockets and two eight round Chip McCormick M1911 magazines two of the pistol mag pockets. IN the third pocket I had a Gerber Paraframe II lock blade knife. Then in the front holster I put another Springfield Armory M1911A1 this one was the Loaded Full Sized in .45ACP. In the mag pouch on the holster I had a third CM M1911 eight round mag.

I went to the bedroom and woke up my roommate. Well I guess the truth is she was my lover. Anyway I don't care now. I kissed her and told her that she needed to get to the Aviation Company she was a pilot in. Deidre Valentine was a Second Lieutenant and flew Blackhawk transport helicopters for the Army Guard. "Hun, get dressed, grab your bug-out gear and one of the pistols from the safe," I said as stood back up and headed for the door to our bedroom. "Be safe dear, it may be a long time before we can see each other again."

Deidre got up and readied herself with a shower then like me she put on her ACUs only hers were in the older Universal Camouflage Pattern. This was the dusty tan, gray, and green tricolor pattern adopted in the early days of the Iraq and Afghan Wars. Now days Guardsmen and Reservists wore either one as they were issued a mixture of each of the Multicam and UCP ACUs.

Deidre then took her combat rig which was customized for her, her own SR556, and Springfield XD pistol. She slipped the pistol into a tactical leg holster and used a bungee style sling to sling her rifle looping it around her neck and right shoulder. She handed me one of two Ops Core FAST ballistic Helmets we owned. I remembered then that as I woke her the caller alerting me said that there were landings all over the city and we may have to fight our way to alternate rally point as Nickell Armory and the rest of the Army National Guard base on Topeka Boulevard was under enemy control. I recalled this as I fastened the spaghetti cord from the left ear phone to my Midland GXT2050VP4 multichannel hand held radio into the HHR pouch on my combat rig. I tossed Deidre the other one in the pair. She put hers away in her HHR pouch. We had built similar rigs wit Condor MOLLE gear a year ago when we both were in the 35th MP Company of the 35th Infantry Division. Then we each went over to the 137th Heavy Brigade Combat Team. Now I commanded a Company in the 3/137 Infantry (Combined Arms) and she was an Assistant S-2 for the HBCT's Intelligence Staff. Afterwards Deidre found that she was interested in flying helicopters and she transferred into the 108th Aviation Regiment.

After we geared up I took a look around our house on 3200 block of SW Stone Avenue and made sure we had everything secure as Deidre made sure we took all the food we had with us. We wouldn't know if or when we'd get more. So we put the frozen vegetables, ice cream, and meat into a portable freezer/ cooler Coleman Chest in the back of our Ford F-150 Raptor. This is a four-door all-wheel drive half-ton pickup truck. Also in the bed of the truck I placed another freezer/ cooler Coleman Chest loaded with the fresh meat, vegetables, milk, OJ, and the left overs we didn't just pitch into the Poly Cart out front.

Our next door neighbor to the south Taylor Michaels was an Army Reserve Chief Warrant Officer 2 just back from a tour to Afghanistan. He was outside loading his son Aaron's Silverado and his Avalanche with supplies and camping gear. Then he took and took off the negative battery cables to his black Toyota Camry and his wife Sandra's Nissan Maxima. Then with his Army Issue e-tool was burying them in his back yard under a concrete paver in his patio.

I looked Taylor and Aaron over they were in UCP ACUs, wearing tactical ballistic plate carrier vests with MOLLE pouches and packs, and carrying their Smith and Wesson M&P15 tactical M4 clones by Bungee slings and in tactical leg holster rigs they had S&W M&P 40 pistols. These were in the .40 S&W caliber that the KBI and TPD used. Taylor took a look at me all geared up and said, "Captain it looks like it's going to be a come as you are war this time ma'am." He had a grin that said to me he looked forward to dealing with the invaders, but his eyes said he was worried for his wife Sabrina and his two step sons Tyler and Alan. Then in a voice tinged with his worry he said, "What am I going to do about Sabrina, Tyler, and Alan? Did OEM say anything about getting the civilians out of harm's way?" OEM was the Office of Emergency Management, Shawnee County's local version of FEMA or the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

I looked to the skies and saw more streaks coming down from on high. The Sun hadn't come up yet. The stars and streaks showed easily as Westar had cut most of the power already. Each of the streaks in the sky was a landing ship or fighter flying through the night sky after entering the atmosphere. It looked like a meteor shower, a deadly meteor shower at that. Every so often the streaks exploded as streaks from the surface rose up and met the ones from space. "Chief, I haven't heard any more on my hand held," I said looking up skyward flinching every so often when the sound of landing ship exploding form an anti-aircraft missile hit reached us. "We have the Midland base radio tuned to NOAA, but there hasn't been an EAS notice since before they cut the power to the city."

From the direction of Nickell Armory you could hear small arms and heavy weapons fire. Likewise there were places along what we could see of the horizon where the glow of uncontrolled fires raised skyward to the heavens. As CWO2 Michael and his son, an Airman in the 190th Security Squadron loaded their Silverado I saw Leo Reynolds loading his Ford F150 and his son's Dodge Ram 1500 with camping gear and non-perishable food items. Leo was a TPD SWAT officer. From where I was I saw him wearing his SWAT tactical gear loading his F-150. I signaled Deidre to finish loading our F-150 Raptor and then walked down the street to talk with Officer Reynolds.

I walked up and saw that Leo had his TPD issue Glock and DMPS M4. He wore Coyote Brown ACUs; Bates 8" tactical boots were on his feet. He had a Ops Core FAST ballistic helmet on like Deidre and I, but his was in the Urban Tan color with black, green, and brown puppy dog foot prints painted on it. I sniggered at seeing that and shook my head saying, "Leo why the hell do you have puppy dog feet on your ballistic helmet?" He looked at me with a smile like a kid gives when they have a secret and aren't going to share it. I just chuckled a bit followed by a giggle snort and said looking him straight in the eyes with as dead pan a face as I could muster at the time, "You know Leo you're one strange cookie."

As I was talking with or really more like at Leo Reynolds three of our neighbors came up. Daniel Lipton from two doors north of me, Lipton's next door neighbor George Waters, and George's wife Alice walked up to us as I saw others behind them gathering around us. Daniel, an Army veteran of Vietnam looked me in the eyes and said, "Captain what are your orders?" He was dressed in vintage Vietnam war OD Green jungle fatigues with an M56 gear LBE battle harness on and carrying an old style AR 15. On his head Daniel wore an M1 steel pot style helmet with a leaf patterned camouflaged helmet cover. The cover had all sorts of Vietnam era graffiti on its surface, one of them was a happy faced stick figure wearing a peace sign medallion and carrying an M16. The caption to that one said _Peace through superior firepower!_

Looking at him I noticed that he still had Sergeant's stripes on the sleeves of his jacket. I also noticed that under his steel pot he wore a OD boonie hat. He also wore an OD Army five button sweater under his jungle fatigue jacket. On his feet was a well broke-in pair of jungle boots. Not the newer ones, but a pair of authentic Vietnam. It was his eyes that said the story besides his old uniform. He'd seen combat before. "Daniel why are you down here? You've fought your war," I said looking into eyes that only recently learned to see peace.

"Ma'am I've been through two wars since I was eighteen. I served in Vietnam and Desert Storm," Daniel said looking me in the eyes with the eyes of a veteran. They were like the eyes of men and women I've known from Baghdad to Kandahar. They were the eyes of one that's see hell and lived to tell about it. His were a smoky gray and around them were wrinkles and crow's feet made a road map of the patrols and battles he fought. "Ma'am this is my war too. These bastards invaded my home and I want to fight back."

"Daniel what are you huh, sixty-four, sixty-five?" I asked letting my eyes go over him in a pre-combat inspection or PCI. I saw he had a field dressing in his first aid and compass pouch. This was on his right shoulder strap of his suspenders with the cover down. On his left suspender strap was a well-used and cared for Camillus combat knife taped to the strap with green duct tape. He had four M56 universal ammo pouches on his harness. One was attached horizontally to the lower part of his left suspender strap just a hand width above another on his belt. Across the buckle of the cotton canvas webbed belt he had a third pouch and next to that one was a fourth. On the back of his belt he had a butt pack or Individual Field Pack. His was the M60 model. On the sides of this he had two canteen carriers with canteens and cups. On his right hip was a M56 e-tool and carrier. From the rigidness of the ammo pouches I figured he had loaded magazines within. In the well of his rifle I saw they were the twenty round straight boxes.

I then looked at George and Alice Waters as Daniel answered my question, "I'm sixty-three ma'am." I nodded and went on to check out the Waters. They showed up wearing what looked to be like new vintage Second World War uniforms. George had on an M1943 field jacket, HBT trousers, HBT Jacket, a Convertible Collar Shirt and the two buckle late war combat boots. His LBE was made up of an M1928 Haversack with Meatcan Pouch, M1923 Cartridge belt, M1910 T-Handle E-Tool with carrier attached to the lid to the haversack, an M1 ten inch bayonet also attached to the lid, an M1910 dismounted canteen cover with a stainless canteen with plastic cap and stainless cup, and an M1942 first aid pouch with a Carlisle pressure dressing. He also had four bandoleers fully loaded with eight round Garand en bloc clips. The pockets of his cartridge belt were also full with loaded en blocs. His haversack has the pack extension attached holding a bedroll made I assume of a shelter half, a raincoat or poncho, two wool blankets, a change of clothing, and the ropes, poles, and pins for the shelter half.

That's when I noticed that his rifle was a well-cared for and maintained M1 Garand. I remember seeing that same rifle proudly displayed over the fireplace of his house just three doors north of the house Deidra and I shared. George had to be in his early to mid-eighties if he had served in the Second World War, but the man looked thirty years younger. I remember at a block party asking him once about his age and he said in reply with a glint in this eye, "Maria child, it's not the age, but the mileage. Like my car and every machine and tool I own I take care of myself and am as healthy as a fit man half my age." I knew that George was eighty-seven as of this year. He looked like a man of fifty-seven.

I looked along the block there were a dozen of us out there loading up trucks, SUVs, and vans. The ages were from fifteen to seventeen all the way upto George's eighty-seven. All were wearing some sort of current or former issue US combat uniform. Most of us had our personal privately owned rifles ranging from AK47s, SKSs, M1s, M1 carbines, AR15s both the M16 and M4 variants, M1As and SOCCOM IIs (variations of the M14) and Ruger Mini-14s or Mini-Thirties. All of us used some sort of MOLLE or ALICE based combat harnesses, chest rigs, and packs. Well except for George, Alice, and Daniel that is.

I looked everyone over making sure they had at least three days' worth of food in their packs, water in their canteens or hydration systems, and ammunition in their pouches for their rifles, shotguns and pistols or revolvers. Then I came up to Alice Waters she wore a World War Two issue uniform with the two buckle combat boots, but her harness was a Second World War medic's harness. This she loaded with modern first aid supplies, over the counter pain relievers, anti-diarrhea medicines, antibiotic creams, and anti-fungal ointments. She also had a field surgical kit in one of the bags. Under the medic's harness she wore an M1937 webbed pistol belt with an M1937 .45 ammo pocket, an M1916 leather holster, some M1 Carbine magazine pouches with fifteen round mags, an M3 Combat Knife with scabbard, two M1910 dismounted canteen covers with canteens and cups, and a Musette Bag for a pack. Alice was a year younger than George and served as a Nurse in both World War Two and Korea and a Doctor in Vietnam. She had a vintage M1A1 Carbine like the paratroopers carried in World War Two.

It was now 0600 hours I looked around and stuck two fingers in my mouth and whistled. "Listen up," I yelled, "Gather around here on me!" The people that were ether Local LEOs, military reservists, or current and former soldiers gathered at the end of my driveway. "Listen up all Active and Reserve military are to report to the nearest Guard Armory or Reserve Station. The only trouble is that most of these drops were near those locations. If you're like me you were told to assemble at an alternative rally point with what gear you had at home and your personal weapons. Now I've done a PCI on all of you. If you don't have enough food, water or ammo go to your home and get it. Also get your families packed up and ready to evacuate."

The people gathered looked at me like I said something strange, I had two heads or something. "Listen people we can't stay here. This city's fast becoming a war zone. If you have camping packs with either external or internal frames and water bottle holders fill the bottles, load your packs with a change of clothing, three days of food, first aid supplies and so on." I looked at the people in uniforms, "We need to get our families out of here and to safety. I know many of you want to go fight these invaders, but we can't leave our families to their mercy."

It was George Waters that got everyone to respond, "Listen up none of except maybe Daniel here has faced this situation. I was in the Boscage in France during the Normandy Campaign and Patton's offensive across France. In the winter of 1944 when the Germans crashed through the Ardennes and broke our lines there surrounding the troops in Bastogne and other towns in southern Belgium and northern Luxembourg I was with the Thirty-Fifth Infantry when we breached the German lines and met up with the troops encircled in Bastogne."

He took a breath and went on, "I was with Major General Edward Almond's Tenth Corps during the retreat from the Chosin Reservoir. Now in a terrible situation like this you don't give up or give in. You resist with all you can and fight until you can't. Resistance, people, isn't futile. Captain Harkness is right we need to get our families to friendly lines and form up with our forces."

I drove my F-150 Raptor out of my driveway and pulled forward and let some of the others get in. I had two Marine Corps Reservists that lived on Attwood Street get in. They each were armed with M4 clones. One took watch out the passenger side and the other out the drivers. Deidre got in as my co-driver and to handle our Midland XT511 Base Camp crank radio. This is a two way radio with weather alert radio, AM, and FM settings. This is an emergency radio with a hand MIC and carry strap. It also has DC and AC power hook ups so Deidre plugged in the DC adapter into the radio and the power outlet in the truck. In the back one of the Naval Reservist who also reenacted World War Two and owned a semiautomatic variant of an M1918 BAR rifle stood in the bed with the bipod resting on two Quickcrete brand bags of sand.

Behind me CWO2 Michaels pulled out followed by his son. One of the other Marine Corps reservist that lived in the neighborhood lit and tossed a Molotov cocktail into each one of the automobiles we were abandoning. We didn't want to leave transportation to the enemy. We drove our convoy to the parking lot of the 29th and Gage Walgreens Drug. I went in with Alice, Daniel, Leo, and Taylor. We went up to the night manager and asked him to give us a few bottles of the narcotic pain relievers and the strongest antibiotics he had. Looking at him I said, "Listen Paul you've got to get your employees out of here and now. Take first aid kits, some of those blanket throws, some cases of bottled water, and any canned or shelf safe boxed food you have. Worry about payment after the war. I don't know if we should trust these folks to respect you and this property."

Paul Rodgers, the Night Manager looked around the store from where we stood looking confused. I shook him just enough to get his attention and said, "Listen Paul we don't have time to hesitate otherwise we risk dying. Now get some of those book bags, grab a couple of those throws each, take some canned soup, boxed crackers, jars of peanut butter, and what food and water you can get into your cars. Get in them head home get your families and head to safety. FEMA's setting up displacement camps north of here according to the EAS alert." He looked around some more. I slapped him and he paid attention to me now, "Paul this ain't no joke this is World War Three and this time I think it's going to be a war of the Worlds. Didn't you see those lights in the skies over head earlier?" He nodded saying he did. "Well those were ships in space battling each other and Christ man we only had a handful of our own fighting back. The enemy drove them off and now we're at the mercy of their invasion forces. If you don't want to serve now, that's ok. Take your family and get the hell away from here or any other major city. Now go man leave get as far away from Topeka as you can and don't go near Lawrence of the Kansas City Area either."

I got back into the parking lot. Looking around I had those not in the cabs of trucks go in and grab cases of bottled water, as many stainless or plastic reusable water bottles as they could find, gather up all the first aid supplies and hygiene supplies they could. We emptied the store of bath soap, pain relievers, tampons, sanitary napkins, pads, etc. We took all the food we could that wouldn't spoil from the shelves and back room.

Deidre had the XT511 on listening to the EAS alerts. She looked at me as I came out of the front doors of the Walgreens and shouted, "Maria, Major Marks is on the horn for you!" I turned my HHR to the channel that MAJ Marks was using. I met Major Andrea Marks; another retreaded MP from the 137th MP Company of the 137th Brigade Support Battalion shortly after the Third of the One Three Seven had been formed in Topeka. MAJ Marks was the battalion's Executive Officer. "Sunflower Five this is Bravo Six, I have taken charge of those reservists and Guardsmen and women that live near me. We're heading to rally point Alpha One, over," I said over the Midland HHR on my rig.

"Bravo Six, Sunflower Five what strength do you have, over?" said MAJ Marks. She sounded like she was using a similar radio to my XT511. I could hear voices in the background and I knew whom I heard. It sounded like she had Major Jordan Riles, the Battalion S-3 or Operations Officer and Captain Janelle Tuck, the Battalion S-2 or Intelligence Officer with her. I looked overhead as my people took their weapons and shot out all the lights shining down on the parking lot.

I clicked my external hand MIC and said, "Sunflower Five, Bravo Six current available under strength platoon. Spot Report, we have enemy fast movers heading north. I count five sets of triple flames." The flames were the engines of the dart-like fighters the enemy was flying. I looked over at Marine Staff Sergeant Allen Stoker. He was armed with a DMPS M4 clone and on the back of his truck he had a weapons mount he had in his restored Dodge Weapons Carrier. This mounted a Barrett M82A1 Light Fifty. He had a Lance Corporal Erin Jones on the Light Fifty. I heard another enemy aircraft coming and LCpl Jones pulled the trigger twice and I swear I saw the port engine flame out and the ship began to go into a flat spin crashing into the abandoned Shell gas station on the northeast corner of 29th and Gage. I clicked the radio MIC again, "Sunflower Five, Bravo Six Spot Report, Enemy troop transport's crashed across the street from us. Sending team over to check it out for intell, over"

"_Roger good copy Bravo Six. Contact this station when you have intell and prisoners, over,"_ MAJ Marks said back to me as I ordered Leo to take Marine PFC Lance Justice, Coast Guard Petty Officer Third Class Tonya Chase, and Air Guard Senior Airman Chantal Carter and clear the wreckage and bring back any prisoners and intell. I told LCpl Jones to cover them with the Light Fifty. That's when I saw Technical Sergeant George Waters (Retired) take up a position behind a Hyundai small sedan with his M1 covering Leo Reynolds and his team.

After about five minutes a short fire fight broke out at the former Shell station and convenience store. After the shooting died down PFC Justice came running back to our position on the parking lot of the Walgreen's his feet pounding out a steady ground eating pace toward us. He got up to me and said in an experienced combat tested voice, "Captain Harkness ma'am we have a Pilot her rear seater, and three troops under guard over there. We need a truck to transport them with us if we want their intell. TPD Sergeant Reynolds has them quick cuffed and here is one of their carbines and a pistol. The pistols look to be almost .50 action express in caliber and the carbines are like large bore versions of the German G36 series weapons."

PFC Justice handed me over the G36 clone and the pistol that looked like a .50 version of an HK or Walther service pistol. The pistol had what looked like a muzzle loading underbarrel grenade launcher. Then he handed me some of the grenades and a couple of spare mags for the pistol. "The grenades look like mini-RPGs ma'am and the bullets for the pistol look to be armor piercing, ma'am," he added after handing me the weapons and samples of their munitions. I looked over to the old gas station as Leo and his team brought the PWs back across Gage towards us.

I yelled into the Walgreens shouting, "Everyone, load up! We're bugging out of this AO ASAP!" As I said this Leo radioed back to me that he overheard the troop carrier's radios and there's a response force coming toot sweet. I looked at Army Reserve Staff Sergeant Walter Morse in the bed of my truck he was armed with a semi-automatic BAR that he used reenacting. Only this time he had it loaded with live ammo. "Walt, help Erin and George provide covering fire to Leo and his team. Leo just said we have company coming fast. I want you to watch north up Gage toward the bridge over Shunga Nunga Creek." Then I yelled over to LCpl Jones, "Jones, use your fifty to cover Twenty-Ninth past Attwood." She replied by giving me a thumbs up and started shifting her point of aim to cover the 29th east toward where it goes up hill.

Five more minutes passed before Leo and his team reached us with their PWs and the rest of the intell they grabbed. About the time the gaggle got to the Walgreen's parking lot Jones opened up with her Barrett again firing at a pair of low flying troop ships coming our way. She was burning through ten round magazines as fast as she could empty them and load another. One of the ships started spinning and crashed into the other. From what I could see in the breaking dawn Jones had hit the first plane's pilot with four rounds and had peppered the second ship with more.

MAJ Marks came back on the radio and said, _"Bravo Six, Sunflower Five, what's your status, over?" _I looked at the area as everyone loaded onto the trucks and into mini-vans, vans, and SUVs. I fired my SR556 at a diving dart shaped fighter diving onto our position. Jones shifted the fire of her Fifty and managed to put five shots into the fuselage and canopy of the jet before it passed by. Its own cannon fire missed the vehicles in our convoy, but destroyed two of the cars belonging to the employees of the Walgreens.

Before I got into my truck behind the steering wheel I replied, "Sunflower Five, Bravo Six we're under fire from enemy fast movers! Where the fuck is our air cover, over?" I looked up as a second enemy jet buzzed us destroying another civilian's car and setting a house across the street to the south a blaze. "Sunflower Five enemy fighters are tearing up the neighborhood trying to fry us. We're bugging out now, how read over?" I yelled into my headset after switch to speak to talk.

"_Bravo Six, Sunflower Five we read good over. No idea on friendly air cover, how read, over?" _Marks replied back to me. I said, "Shit," under my breath as I saw another pair of those enemy dart shaped fighters coming our way from the north. I looked at my people and said over the radio after switching to our push we established back up on Stone only a quarter to a half mile away from us, "Ok people head down Twenty-Ninth for Wanamaker. Drive as fast as you can. Dodge any disabled vehicles you encounter. Fire up any enemy patrols and clear the area as fast as possible. We're bugging out now people!" We had our dependents with us and I wasn't sacrificing anyone's families for a military operation.

Major Marks looked at the map laid out on the hood of her Escalade. She wasn't the only one relying on civilian vehicles and radios this day. With Nickell Armor and other military facilities in Topeka under enemy control all issue hardware was in the wrong hands. She cursed ash she listened to the progress of Bravo Six's convoy. Taking the hand MIC of her own Midland XT511 she called back to Bravo Six, "Bravo Six, Sunflower Five head to phase line Whiskey along route Two Niner, how copy, over?"

I heard her clearly, "Roger Five we've just passed phase line Foxtrot," by that I meant we passed the intersection of Fairlawn Avenue and 29th Street. We moved on past I-470 westward toward Wanamaker. We were five blocks from the intersection of 29th and Wanamaker when I saw something that warmed my heart. There overhead of us flew a flight of four F/A 22 Raptors. I don't know if we could contact them or not, but I saw their cannons open up on something to the east of us.

LCpl Jones called over her HHR to me, "Captain we have friendly overwatch. They just downed two of those darts the enemy's flying." I looked back through my driver's side rear view mirror to see two blossoms of fire followed by wreckage falling earthward. In seconds this was followed by twin plumes of smoke rising skyward.

We topped the hill just before 29th and Wanamaker and there I saw something that just made me wish this was all a bad nightmare caused by a bit of undigested potato or a sour grape. I pulled my 8x compact field binoculars from my left breast pocket of my ACU jacket. Looking through them I saw a road block ahead of us.

_**Intersection SW Wanamaker and SW 29**__**th**__** Street:**_

_Lieutenant Jonas had set up a road block and checkpoint at the road junction where two paved roads met. Using some captured tractor trailer rigs his platoon captured near the round-about a mile to the west they set up a barricade to stop traffic along the east-west and north-south running streets. On the roofs of nearby businesses he had lookouts posted with sniper teams. He made a nearby bank building his command post._

"_Red One, Red Two, enemy spotted. We have movement on the east-west street to the east of our position," Crew Sergeant Lidia Hadrian said over the Platoon's wireless net. Lt Jonas took out his binoculars and focused in on the location that Hadrian told him to check. There was a white four-door pickup truck with someone manning a light machinegun over the roof. Then there was a red one with another similar light machine gunner doing the same. Next in an alternating pattern there were six other trucks mixed with vans and sport utility trucks spread out like the ribs of a fileted fish. _

_He checked his roadblocks. The trailers were tipped over on their sides with cars and other vehicles left in the parking lots piled up around them. From the nearby businesses crates of goods were stacked around the cars to fill gaps in the walls he had made by his platoon. Parked on the side of the bank was an SUV that resembled a Colonial light tactical truck. In the nearby ditch his men and women sat up a mortar and another behind a couple of cars parked in a V shape on the parking lot overlooking the intersection. He had one squad in ambush along the east leg of the east-west running road and another on the north leg of the north-south road. His forth squad was on the roadblock and his first or Platoon HQ was the bank except for the weapons team_

_Not impressive yet this position effectively cut the roads without using a cratering charge. Each of his men carried a single tube disposable anti-tank rocket launcher along with their Colonial issue assault rifles. He felt he could hold this from all but a battalion sized attack._

"_Scout One to Base One, we have scouted as far as a crossroads on a part of the intersection of the main north-south business road and an east-west mixed road. I have set up a roadblock and check point. I hear some engine noise coming from the east along the east-west road to my immediate east. I have my third squad in a position to use its anti-armor missiles against any enemy vehicles. I think that would be a perfect way to cut the east west road and maybe stop anyone from trying to leave along this route. How do you copy Base One?" 1LT Jonas gave his report and settled into his fighting position._

_**Hilltop on 29**__**th**__** street one half mile from 29**__**th**__** and Wanamaker**_

The enemy had got to 29th and Wanamaker before we could. I sat in behind my steering wheel looking in dismay at the fortifications made from cars and semi-trailers. I reached for the handset of the XT511 and called MAJ Marks, "Sunflower Five, Bravo Six have encountered enemy road block. We don't have any anti-armor ordnance and we are armed only with surplus mil-spec weapons and civilian legal M4 clones. The heaviest thing we have is a Light Fifty." My HHR was still on our agreed to convoy push so I clicked the key and told LCpl Jones, "Jonesy take a look-see through your binoculars and see what you can see."

"Yes ma'am," Jones said. It took a few minutes before she returned a spot report, "Skipper I see enemy troops estimated platoon strength. There seems to be an LP-OP on the roof of the convenience store on the northwest corner and another on the roof of the back just south of the southwest corner. I can take the observer on either before those holding the roadblock could respond." I took my compact binoculars and took another look at the roadblock. I spat out a curse at the mother humper manning that redoubt. I opened the glove compartment and drew out a Topeka street map. I looked where we were and saw that we could go north and reach 21st street by going through the neighborhood.

"Bravo Six to all Bravo elements turn north and rendezvous at Twenty-First and Westport! Move! Move! Move!" I Threw my truck into reverse and did a Y turn to get onto a nearby north bound side street. I dodged and weaved through the abandoned streets where mostly the civilians elected to stay in until the authorities said it was safe to leave, or they had bugged out earlier before the bad guys took over some of the major intersections. One could see the debris of hastily packed cars, trucks, and other personal vehicles scattered along the streets as we drove north. Everywhere there were abandoned suitcases, book bags, backpacks, Styrofoam coolers, and clothing of every size, shape, and color. I even had to dodge the occasional dumped over trash can or poly cart.

Some cases as I looked out the windows of my truck I saw evidence of disagreements crossing the line to murder. Every now and then there was the body of some fool that either tried to force an issue with someone who was a better shot or some poor soul who should have learned to use a gun. Speed being of the need I floored it as we drove through the residential streets leading my convoy north to the next major street. We blew the intersection just west of the I-470 interchange and turned left toward Wanamaker. The alternate rally point for the Third of the One Three Seven was the parking lot of Wal-Mart and Sam's Club.

On our way there I had us blow through the lights at 21st and Westport, 21st and Wanamaker, 19th and Wanamaker, and 17th and Wanamaker. I took the turn at the entrance by the Golden Corral doing nearly sixty. I had us tear across the parking lot towards Wal-Mart's garden center and the small parking lot separating that from Sam's Club. I had us circle our trucks and other vehicles. After I stopped I quickly turned off the ignition and jumped out of my truck. I looked up at the Marine Reservist on the BAR and said, "Private keep up there and watch for aerial attacks." I trooped the line of vehicles and had those in the bed of the pickups stay there behind the cabs with their weapons watching the skies for trouble. Then I had each driver meet me at the center of our circled wagons.

I ran over to my truck and grabbed the XT511 from the front seat. Leaving Deidre and PVT Randle Troost to watch over the truck, I took the radio with me so I could contact MAJ Marks again. "Sunflower Five, Bravo Six sitrep, we are at Objective Whiskey Mike Sierra Charlie, over."

The air was so still at the moment that I could hear the electronic bells chime the hour from the bell tower on Washburn Campus here at the Wal-Mart parking lot. I was waiting for Major Marks to call me back when suddenly the screeching scratchy noise of the Emergency Alert System alert tone came over. _"This is the Federal Emergency Management Agency at Zero Six Thirty Hours this morning the following cities in the United States of America suffered a nuclear attack. The devastated cities are east to west New York, New York, Washington D.C., Norfolk, Virginia, Miami, Florida, Atlanta, Georgia, Mobile, Alabama, Nashville, Tennessee, Louisville, Kentucky, Cincinnati, Ohio, Cleveland, Ohio, Indianapolis, Indiana, Chicago, Illinois, Saint Louis, Missouri, Kansas City, Missouri, Kansas City, Kansas, Omaha, Nebraska, Wichita, Kansas, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, Houston, Texas, Austin, Texas, Denver, Colorado, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Salt Lake City, Utah, Phoenix Arizona, San Diego, California, Los Angeles, California, San Francisco, California, Portland, Oregon, Seattle, Washington. If you live down wind of these cities take fallout protection precautions immediately. This has been an Emergency Alert we will now return to your regularly scheduled programming…"_

I just sat there looking down at the radio I had slung from its carry strap still holding the hand MIC. It was incredible someone had actually nuked the United States of America. I felt my stomach fall as I stood there listening to the reports on NPR. The cities of London, Berlin, Paris, Marseilles, Rome, Cairo, Tel-Aviv, New Dheli, Baghdad, Riyad, Johannesburg, Hamburg, Ontario, Quebec, Montréal, Vancouver, Soule, Beijing, Taipei, Tokyo, Yokohama, Manila, Hanoi, Brisbane, Sydney, Buenos Aeries, Rio de Jarnero, Sal Paulo, Madrid, and the list went on. It was as if every major communications center, capital, or industrial center was attacked. Who could have ordered such an attack?

About that time Major Marks showed up in her Escalade with Captain Tuck and Major Riles. The Major came over to me and we walked about the perimeter of my caravan. She saw that I had a mixture of troops from various units across the city. There were ten Marine Corps Reservists, Twelve Army Reservists, five Naval Reservists, three active duty Coast Guardsmen and women from the Coast Guard Financial Services Unit, there were two dozen Army Guardsmen and women, and a like number of Air Guardsmen and women from my neighborhood. That was before you counted in the thirty or so military retirees and veterans who joined our group.

Shortly after we returned to my truck a small convoy of the new deuce and a half cargo trucks showed. Command Sergeant Major Damian Passau jumped out of the lead truck and ran over to us. He was in full combat rigging with an M4A1 from the Armory slung in front of him from a bungee sling.

Major Marks talked with him for a few minutes and then came back to me and in a grim voice spoke, "Captain it looks like you're stuck with your civilian vehicles for the time being. The few vehicles you had at the Armory in your part of the motor pool were destroyed by enemy fighters during the battle to regain the Armory. CSM Passau managed to load up on what ammunition and MREs we had in the warehouses there and secured those two HEMMIT fuelers filling one with diesel and the other with MOGAS. Once your people have loaded up on beans, bullets and fuel you need to take your troops down toward Sixth and Wanamaker. I want you to recon Menninger Hill and Cedar Crest and test just what the enemy landed there. The Battalion Commander can't be reached. The phone lines are jammed and Cellular service around here is spotty at best." Then the XO handed me a folder with photos of Topeka and Lawrence printed off from Goggle Earth and maps of the towns from Goggle Maps. "Be glad we still have internet service here. We lost all satellite communications two hours ago. Even Dish Network and Direct TV are down."

"As for fighting, I have reports that some enemy patrols have entered the downtown area after CSM Passau withdrew from the Armory and the only resistance we've offered so far are a few Topeka Police Officers, Shawnee County Sheriff's Deputies, and Army and Air National Guardsmen and Army, Marine Corps, and Navy Reservists doing their best to hold," CPT Tuck added.

CPT Tuck looked at me then, "I scaled the maps on my computer so that they will work with the standard 1:50,000 map grid and protractors. GPS is down by the way." She then handed me a digital picture of a craft in a cow pasture west of town that resembled an oversized version of the lifting bodies that NASA experimented with back in the 1960s or 70s. I saw one of those on display once in Hutchinson at the Cosmosphere and Space Museum a few years back.

I looked at the picture, "So that is what those streaks of light were this morning." I looked the picture over and noticed that there were men and women around taking up security positions around the craft. "This has to be a landing craft of some kind."

MAJ Riles looked up and nodded, "That's what we figured. Now from reports we got from a HAM radio operator before he was taken off the air, approximately a battalion's strength unit has taken Auburn. Elements of this battalion have cut I-70 and the junction with Auburn Road. As the XO said your avenue of advance will be up Wanamaker. B Company or rather your ad hoc company with HHC following you will move up and recon Menninger Hill and the grounds of Cedar Crest. D Company and C Company will travel I-70 from Junction City and Manhattan. Those companies are our reserves for now. A Company is busy in Lawrence at the moment. This is classic movement to contact Maria."

CPT Tuck then said, "Don't stop and take any prisoners. Just blow through any resistance until you reach Menninger Hill itself. HHC will mop up behind you. If you get into a real cat fight out there we'll come up on whatever flank is open to hit the enemy like a hammer on your anvil." I nodded as I took notes on a pocket sized memo pad. I felt that trusting my iPad or any other electronic device wouldn't be all that wise in the long-term.

MAJ Riles pointed out, "My people have updated all map boxes with the most recent topographical information on the area of operations." He then handed me one of the hardened laptops normally fed with GPS data and satellite updates. "As soon as the whole brigade is on scene we are going to push forward to recover the rest of Topeka before heading out to Hays and taking out that landing zone." He showed me the basic plan on another printed out map showing this area of Topeka. "I won't kid you Captain, the enemy is reported to be in division strength in this area. Our main mission is to find out what is there and wait for elements of the First Infantry and the First Armored divisions from Fort Riley and the rest of the Thirty-Fifth Infantry Division from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas City, Wichita, Topeka, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Missouri."

Looking incredulously at MAJ Riles I said, "Do you think the Second and First Battalions can reach us after what happened to Kansas City and Wichita?" Then looking away from him as the XO looked at me again, "Don't try to win this battle all by yourself Captain. We have reinforcements from Fort Carson in Colorado coming too. We are going to try to encircle these troops on their landing zone." She gave me a smile of encouragement. "To aid us Joint Forces Command sent us the 75th Civil Support Team."

I looked at her and MAJ Riles saying, "Isn't the 75th a counter terrorism unit made up of Army Guard, Air Guard, and Kansas Highway Patrol personnel?" I just wondered which wise ass in the TAG's office or the Kansas Division of Emergency Management thought this one up.

"Yes Captain it is. It also has some FBI and Kansas Bureau of Investigation or KBI agents as well. Now the FBI liaison with them is versed in counter intelligence and interrogation techniques." The XO handed me a picture of a woman wearing black BDUs, a police black tactical vest armed with an UMP. "This is Rachelle Bowman the FBI Special Agent assigned to the 75th CST (CT). She will be working with you and your XO."

I guess Deidre was acting as my XO in this matter as B company hadn't fully formed up yet. I saw a few more cars, trucks, vans, and SUVs pull up loaded with Guardsmen and their families. I looked over to my truck and waved Deidre to get over here. Deidre was my partner for twenty years and we always managed never to get discharged from the service because of our relationship. I guess it had to do with us not rocking the boat and not making a spectacle of ourselves. "Deidre see if you can find my XO and tell him to come over here. If you find Top Grimes tell him to get here too." First Sergeant Allen Grimes was my company's First Sergeant or senior NCO. He was a veteran of Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm, Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan. Deidre ran off toward the cars that arrived recently calling out for First Lieutenant Frederick Myers and Top Grimes.

While Deidre did that my operations NCO came walking up wearing the uniform of a Waffen SS Feldwebel or Staff Sergeant. He had on an Oak A dot patterned smock over an M1944 dot pattern tunic and trousers. His M1942 German steel helmet had a dot pattern cloth cover with straps and eyelets for placing camouflage around the helmet. The funny thing was that in the real Army National Guard Peter Wiles was a Staff Sergeant so I let him keep his rank insignia, but took him aside and told him to ditch the Waffen SS collar tabs and the left sleeve Nazi Eagle patches. Then we went over the plan for B Company reinforced with volunteers from my neighborhood's veteran and military reservist population to recon up Wanamaker, Menninger Hill, and the grounds of the Governor's Mansion, Cedar Crest. SSG Wiles carried his privately owned AK47 and a Mauser K98 with a sniper's rig. He also had a Walther P38 in a belt holster on his weapons belt. I didn't make him lose the belt buckle, but I began asking Captain James Patton, the S4 if he could get us some issue MOLLE gear for my troops without it.

MAJ Marks came up to me and said, "We have Blackhawks and Chinooks coming from Fort Riley with more ammo, food, and other supplies. Once your company is squared away get them moving up Wanamaker." The helicopters roared in and landed in the mostly vacant parking lots around Wal-Mart and Sam's Club. We also managed to break into Wal-Mart and grabbed what 12 gauge, .223/ 5.56, 7.62x39, 7.62x54, .30-06 Springfield, .45ACP, and 9mm Lugar/ Parabellum cartridges they had in the ammo case and in back stock. The twelve gauge shotguns, .30-06 and .308 bolt action rifles, Ruger Mini-14s, and Mini-30s they had in stock went to arm my men and women that didn't have a weapon. After the Blackhawks and Chinooks with supplies and ammo landed in the LZ we set up in parking lots we distributed the needed rations, fuel, bullets, we had in our company. The supplies for our Abrams tanks and Bradleys we left on the helos as those vehicles were so much scrap iron on the ground at the Armory.

Then we drove and walked out of the parking lot onto Wanamaker between Steak and Shake and Panera Bread taking that north to Sixth Street. When we got to the Sixth and Wanamaker Round About I dismounted everyone but my M249 Gunners, M240 Gunners, M1918/ BAR Gunners and M82A1 Gunner. I had the dismounts spread out in a wedge formation as we traversed the grounds of the Old Menninger Hospital. I ordered my pickup trucks to keep a thirty to fifty meter interval side to side terrain allowing.

We had 50 meters between each vehicle and 100 between each platoon. I had the Technicals forward with First Platoon escorting them. HQ Platoon was in the middle with Second, Third, and Maintenance to our sides. In my truck which I used for my Command Vehicle or CV I had the XT511radio on the Battalion Push and NPR or National Public Radio. My hand held was on the Company push and set for NOAA alerts.

This hell seemed to be going on all over the World from the reports I was hearing on NPR. This was our generation's Pearl Harbor, Fort Sumter, and Lexington and Concord all rolled up into one. The NPR news reports had landings happening all over the World from the United States, China, Russia, Germany, Kenya, Brazil, South Africa, England, France, India, Mexico, Argentina, and Australia. It seemed the only continent not getting visited by the enemy was Antarctica.

I looked at Special Agent Rachelle Bowman in my rearview mirror; she had checked her H&K UMP, the .45ACP version of the MP-5 for the tenth time. "Agent Bowman relax, you've checked your weapon plenty." I know this because I used to do that as a Second Lieutenant in Iraq and Afghanistan when out on patrols. "Checking your weapon constantly will only risk an accidental discharge and add to the wear and tear of your piece." She glared at me as if to say mind your own business.

When we reached where Sixth Street joined Wanamaker I stopped my truck to watch my platoons maneuvered onto the Menninger grounds. After my first platoon passed over the curb and there was about twenty meters between the last soldier and my truck I led the Company HQ Platoon into the Menninger campus. We followed the lay of the terrain on the hill as we made our way to the old central campus. We skirted both sides of the western small lake and then cleared a couple of the outer buildings finding only transients nesting in them.

We continued our tactical spacing as we rolled on toward the old main administration building past the burned our ruins of a building once used by Core First Bank as a data center. I halted my truck and CWO3 Michaels halted near me with the BAR gunner in his bed covering us. My gunner now had an M240 and he covered the front of the admin building as First Platoon's troops began to systematically clearing the place floor by floor and room by room.

As we covered First Platoon, Second Lieutenant Patricia Payton came up to me and rapped on my truck window to get my attention. "Captain Harkness we've cleared the west building. We've only found a handful of homeless and a few pot heads. I sent them on their ways telling them that this place was about to go to shit soon. I don't think any of them wanted to be here when the bad guys show up."

"Payton have your people dig in. Only put LP-Ops on the upper floors. Run land lines from them to your Platoon CP. Then put pickets out about fifty meters in front of your position. If they don't have a clear, but concealed view of the areas downhill have them move to where they can and still communicate with you." I wished now that I had my two platoons of M1A1 Abrams and two platoons of M2A1 Bradleys. What wasn't destroyed here, a section of two tracks each were still at MATES in Camp Funston on Fort Riley, just west of Ogden, Kansas. "Lieutenant you need to make sure you have overlapping fields of fire for everyone.

I then looked at the mapbox to see what the map of the area showed me. It was a Google maps map and it wasn't all that good in detail. I reached back for one of my map cases. Once I had it up front I dug out one of my 1:25000 scale maps of Topeka from . This one was of this part of the city. Taking the handset of the PRC117 (SINCGARS) radio given to me I pushed the button to get me on the Company Push. "Bravo Six to all Bravo Stations finish clearing your assigned sectors and then dig in. Make sure you have overlapping fields of fire and get your troops to digging firing positions and communications trenches." I then took a military template and plotted out my company's positions.

This was to be our overnight position, but from what I saw coming this way the enemy still had local air superiority. I missed having good anti-aircraft weapons. I'd give a three day pass to the soldier that could scrounge us up some Stingers or other SAM missiles. The lawn dark like jets the enemy used were still dog fighting our atmospheric fighters and the bat winged aerospace fighters with Air Force markings, but there weren't enough of our birds overhead.

I was looking down the valley that Wanamaker ran through at this end of the street and saw mechanized vehicles moving up and soldiers in what looked like black BDU or ACU type uniforms. The troops looked to be wearing tactical vests similar to those we wore and carrying assault rifles that looked like the German G36 on steroids. "Heads up people we have tangoes coming up Wanamaker. They're clearing the stores and shops along the street so far. I want everyone to wait until you have a clear target. Wait until they've passed Sixth Street before opening up on them," I said over my HHR to my Platoon and Squad Leaders.

As I reassured my men and women I felt someone next to me. I glanced to my right and there stood Tech SGT George Waters and SGT Daniel Lipton. Behind them stood TPD Sergeant Leo Reynolds and my well wife Second Lieutenant Deidre Valentine. It was Tech Sergeant Waters that spoke, "Captain Harkness ma'am we volunteer to scout forward to the Security Benefit Group's campus. We can see what the Blackies are doing all that well once they get near I-70 unless they cross over the Wanamaker overpass."

It seems since the roadblock at 29th and Wanamaker the men and women in my little command called the enemy Blackies because of their black uniforms. I looked back down Wanamaker from my OP then looked at Tech Sergeant Waters. I saw a lot of determination in his eyes. "Ok George, but don't overdo it down there. Remember you're not some seventeen year old recruit or a twenty-something Specialist or Sergeant anymore. Take your time, do things right, don't do anything heroic. I truly don't want to deal with Alice if you go and get yourself killed old man," I said straight faced, but the care for my friend and neighbor still crept into my voice.

I looked over to Deidre smiled, and said, "That goes double for you young lady. I don't want to tell your mom I lost you doing some fool dumb assed heroic shit down there. Come back safe to me kid. I'll keep the sleeping bag warm." Normally in peace time the two of use being in the same command would have been an offense of the UCMJ. But in peace time Deidre and I are in different chains of command. Her battalion was part of the 35th Combat Aviation Brigade. My battalion was part of the 137th Heavy Brigade Combat Team and part of the Fourth Infantry Division out of Fort Carson Colorado. The 134th Infantry Brigade Combat Team out of Nebraska was the nearest unit of the Thirty-Fifth Infantry Division. For training though we fell administratively under the Thirty-Fifth.

Thanks to this extraterrestrial invasion though, Deidra became part of my command. I looked at the other three and said, "Watch out for each other, don't take any unnecessary risks. Remember Patton said you don't win wars by dying for your country, but by making the other dumb bastard die for his." As I said that we heard the sounds of aircraft cannons overhead followed by an explosion. Looking up I found I saw a lawn dart exploding, but its pilot ejected and his chute was bringing him down within our position. "Jonesy, grab two others and secure that pilot!" I yelled to the Marine that took to carrying the M82A1. LCpl Jones looked at the USMC PFC that took to manning one of the restored M1918A1 BARs, then at another Marine armed with an M70 Yugoslavian AK47 variant.

"Garcia, Miller your with me," yelled Jones. Then she went running toward the trees where the pilot came down. Ten minutes later there was a shot that sounded like it came from the AK47. Another ten minutes passed and I saw Jonesy followed by PFC Garcia and PVT Miller cradling the pilot over their shoulders between them each holding one of the pilot's arms over their outer shoulders. The pilot dragged his feet by his toes along the ground. His right leg was bandaged. He still had his helmet on. It reminded me of the space helmets on the space suits of the 1960s movie _2001: A Space Odyssey._

I called up a medic and Alice Waters came running up to the CP's OP with Sergeant Sharon Vincent and Specialist Lydia Huntsman. SGT Vincent looked like she could be a twin to Deidre and SPC Huntsman looked like a twin to the Canadian actress model Tricia Helfer. "Alice you and the medics look after this enemy pilot and see to his…" I left the sentence hanging as I noticed the rise of her breasts under the space suit like flight suit. "Umm… excuse me her wounds."

LCpl Jones ordered PFC Garcia and PVT Miller to lay her on the ground. I looked down into the clear face plate of the helmet. The woman had blond hair and her skin looked like it had been sometime since she last seen any sun. She had a pasty complexion at the moment. "Wake her up. I want Deidre to interrogate her," I said sharply as I knelt beside the unconscious pilot. I had PFC Garcia and PVT Miller bind her ankles, wrists, and elbows with large quick ties.

LCpl Jones smiled and said, "Yes Ma'am Captain Harkness." Then she took a spare canteen from her tactical vest, opened its cap, and after PFC Garcia unfastened and took off the pilot's helmet upended it and dumped its contents in the pilot's face. The woman sputtered, spit the water out and then tried to hit whoever it was that threw water in her face. She saw that her hands and arms had been restrained with zip-ties.

I knelt over her smiling holding her pistol in my off hand. My SR556 was slung around my neck and upper chest by a bungee sling. "I hope you speak English miss, because I don't think anyone of my people speak whatever it is that's your native language."

_**Alpha Centauri A-3 high orbit L-Day + 1 3 October 2013 CE/ 3 October YR 1997**_

CFB (Colonial Fleet Battlestar) Valkyrie floated in a geosynchronous orbit over the western continent of the Caprica-like world below. Colonel Saul Tigh stood at the plot table in the Combat Information Center eyeing the DRADIS display. DRADIS showed a Caprica sized world that other sensors detected a breathable atmosphere, liquid water, and minerals valuable to Colonial industry. Across the table stood Commander William Adama the commanding officer of the Valkyrie. He looked up at his executive officer and asked in a tone that wanted his opinion, "What do you think Saul? This isn't Earth, but do you think we should establish a base here?"

Col. Tigh looked at the reports from the Raptors sent to scout this system then at the information displayed on a monitor next to the DRADIS readout. "Well Bill this is a paradise and could very well make a good home for a forward operations base. We have breathable air. There's both fresh and salt water. There's vegetation not that different from Caprica and it's by far better than either that frozen waste land world or the nuclear wasteland world we found. This system as a Tauron-like planet in the third orbit of the larger companion and the red dwarf third companion fluxes so much that its potential habitable world is sterilized every twenty years or so. I think this world would make the best for the forward most base for this operation. The Tau'ri won't know what hit them when the main fleet jumps in from here."

Adama nodded he was second in command of Battlestar Group 44. His ship was the main escort for the Battlestar Atlantia BS-41 a Mod-1 Mercury-Class Battlestar. BSG-44 had been assigned to scout the star systems closest to Earth in preparation for the final assault of the Liberation Fleet. He looked into his XO's eyes and said, "I agree Saul we could build the base both on and above this world and establish a new colony for the Colonies. You heard the President's speech before we left."

Saul nodded and said, "Yes he said beside all that crap about liberating the frakking Earthers from the yoke of Tau'ri tyranny that any habitable worlds we find would allow the spreading of human civilization far and wide so that if the main colonies are attacked by the Cylons we won't all perish. That these colony worlds would allow us places to rebuild, regroup, and retrain to reclaim the home colonies."

Adama smiled at his XO and friend of over thirty years, "Yes and now we have two worlds that would allow us to spread out further from our distant cluster of worlds. These two planets, Earth, and Kobol are so far the only worlds we found beyond the Colonies that can comfortably support life. That ice age world in that nebula would work only as a military colony, but Kobol and these two planets could be colonized with civilians to support military operations against the Tau'ri. Admiral Nagala has sent a communique from the Atlantia and the Tauron like world will be used as an agricultural colony to support this colony. The Colonial Fleet Construction Battalions with us will begin to immediately building both a dirt side base and an orbital base. We're to remain on station to protect the construction of New Caprica Colonial Fleet Station and Colonial Marine Corps Base."

Saul looked over at Adama smiling then said, "So we're staying then."

"Yes Saul we're staying. This time six month from now we'll be conducting military operations against Earth and any nearby colonies of the Tau'ri. We finally will pay them back for the destruction of BSG-12. Then we'll free Earth and bring into the United Colonies as full member and go on to free the other human worlds in this part of the spiral arm. Well at least that's Fleet HQ's plan anyway. Me I think it was a mistake to try to force the Prometheus to surrender and return to Pico Fleet Headquarters just because the Earth ship had a malfunction with its FTL drive and fell out of this hyperspace they talked of in the meetings before thing went all pear-shaped," Adama said as he looked at the DRADIS and its showing of all the ships of Task Force Myrmidon.

TF Myrmidon was made up of BSG-41, BSG-75, MSG (Marinestar Group)-23, FSG-2 (Fleet Support Group). The Atlantia was the Task Force's Flag Ship. It was two days later on this ship Admiral Marcus Nagala stood to the side of the main tactical plot table in the War Room. There surrounding the table were the commanders of the Task Force's escort ships and other capital ships. "Gentlemen," there were ladies in the room as half of his ships' commanders were female; "Commander Adama surveyed the Caprica like world in the main system of this triple star system. It seems New Caprica is suitable for a permanent colony. It is a treasure house not only of industrial resources, but it's habitable by humans."

Rear Admiral Jonas Swale commanding officer of Fleet Support Group Two looked at the holographic image of the planet in the primary system. He studied the reports from Commander Adama and his scout group. Looking up at the image of New Caprica he made his decision, "Admiral Nagala I know we aren't the primary force in the attack on Earth, but we are the forward most at this time. I just want to know if we should prepare a full service base here or just a forward support base."

Nagala smiled at him understanding what Rear Adm. Swale was asking. He looked up from his copies of Adama's reports and at the image of the slowly rotating holographic globe of New Caprica. "Admiral Swale we're going to be building the second largest operational base for the Colonial Fleet next to Picon Fleet Yards. New Caprica Fleet Yards and its associated ground side base will be the largest join forces base in the Colonial Armed Forces. But we have to get started and part of that is to establish an agricultural station here on New Tauron.

_**Earth mid-orbit L-Day + 1 3 October 2013 CE/ 3 October YR 1997**_

The USS George S. Hammond DSC-304-6 was cloaked in a geosynchronous orbit cloaked over the ruins of Colorado Springs, Colorado in the United States of America. At the moment it and the USS Apollo were the only DSCs in orbit of Earth. The other DSCs were in the Tau Ceti system with Atlantis. Atlantis itself was cloaked and moored off the shore of the western continent of Tau Ceti 3. The mission of the Hammond and Apollo were to recover as many senior officers not directly involved in the guerilla war growing against the Colonial Occupation of Earth. The Hammond had beamed up the Earth's stargate and had it safely secured in one of its holds.

On the bridge of the Hammond Brigadier General Samantha Carter, United States Air Force sat in the Commander's Chair watching the planet, her planet below through the main view port. The transparent trinium-naquadah-titanium reinforced window was lattice worked with framing to aid in resisting impacts and other damage. The ship itself could withstand the explosive eruption of the largest volcano on Earth, Yellowstone National Park.

Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Marks, her XO, senior pilot and Weapons Officer was monitoring the sensor feed at his station when he looked up to her and said, "We're detecting lots of spatial anomalies in the Alpha Centauri A and B systems. It's like someone's running some sort of fleet exercise over there." He with a flick of his fingers transferred the sensor feed to the Holographic Heads Up Tactical Display.

The HUD's holographic display depicted the neighboring triple star system with Alpha Centaur A and Alpha Centauri B orbiting a common bray-point while Alpha Centauri C or Proxima Centauri orbited the inner pair from a far orbit. Every so often there were blue dots signifying the spatial anomalies appearing and disappearing within the two larger systems. The anomalies were concentrated around the third planets of Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B. Col. Carter leaned forward to look over the activity in the Earth's celestial neighbor's backyard and using the holographic user's interface she enlarged Alpha Centauri A until she was looking at Alpha Centauri A3 or the world the SGC designated Prometheus in honor of the now destroyed first Battle Cruiser.

Carter increased the sensor magnification of that system and Prometheus until the Asgard developed sensors of the Hammond showed her the unmistakable outlines of a Colonial Battlestar and she let slip, "Oh shit, not them… I thought they left behind only a garrison here after they chased us away yesterday. It looks like they're building a base over there from all the activity. Marks record this data. We'll have to send this to the Joint Chiefs on Atlantis as soon as you do and Major Hailey, get me a subspace link to Atlantis ASAP

"Yes Ma'am," replied Maj. Hailey as she complied with Brig. Gen. Carter's order. "Ma'am I have General O'Neill in Atlantis' control room with the President." As she said that Hailey, Carter's Communications, Science, and Navigation Officer replaced the tactical map with a holographic video signal between the Hammond and Atlantis' Control Room. Gen. O'Neill was President John Patrick Ryan's Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and he looked annoyed at the interruption. Behind him stood Director Woolsey of the Atlantis' Scientific Research Team and newly sworn in President Jack Ryan. Ryan had been Kinsey's replacement after the attack on Earth by Anubis as Henry Hayes' Vice President. The former POTUS was dead thanks to a fifty megaton thermonuclear air burst over D.C.

"General O'Neill, Mister President we have sensor readings of the Alpha Centauri system showing that the Colonials are establishing a base there. Lt. Col. Marks detected the signature spatial anomalies of their FTL system. It's like they're running a fleet operation over there. My thoughts are that their taking the Alpha Centauri system to help protect their hold on the Sol system sirs," Carter said looking both men in the eyes as she made her report.

President Ryan looked at her then held his hands steepled before his lips as he thought the information over. He looked up at her and said, "General Carter I want you to dispatch the Apollo on a reconnaissance and intelligence gathering mission to the Alpha Centauri system. Colonel Sheppard is to collect all SIGINT, ELINT, and HUMINT he can. He's to take as many pictures as possible without exposing himself to attack. He's not to risk the Apollo. We just don't have the ships to spare for any heroic raids right now. As soon as we get operations started here and have ships under construction we'll be raiding their operations in the Sol System and the Alpha Centauri System soon enough." He looked determined to win this war no matter the cost.

"New spatial disturbance near Mars detected, ma'am!" Marks shouted as he transferred that data to the Holo-HUD after splitting the screen so that both Brig. Gen. Carter and the President could see what he was talking about. The disturbance was the signature of a Colonial ship exiting its form of jump drive. Then Marks increased the scale. On the screen now Mars looked like a medicine ball and the ship that exited the jump point looked like a starfish or a jack from a game of jacks. Carter leaned in to examine the double Y shaped hulls connected and rotating on a central axial column.

President Ryan looked at the ship that had almost as soon as it came out of jump near Mars launched a fighter screen. The starfish shaped ship took up a position behind Phoebus to conceal it from Colonial sensors. Then the POTUS looked over at a large flat screen monitor. There on the screen which Brig. Gen. Carter saw from her vantage point on the Hammond showing more spatial anomalies in a star system just over fifteen light years coreward of Earth followed by a like number appearing in the Sirius System just 8.6 light years from Earth. There were at least a dozen entrance and exit points.

Carter looked at the image of the ship near Mars. It had moved from its first position to its final one using what seemed to be a reactionless maneuver drive. "Sirs I think this ship and the ones now in the Sirius System aren't Colonial. I think we have a new player in the Galaxy. These aren't some splinter faction of the Free Jaffa or a faction of the Lucian Alliance either. They may have an FTL similar to the Colonials, but their maneuver drives are similar to the old Goa'uld ones only a bit faster."

**Chapter Two**

**The Cylons Were Created By Man…**

**They Rebelled…**

**They Evolved…**

**There Are Many Copies…**

**And They Have a Plan…**

"Load up on guns and bring your friends,"

Nirvana "Smells Like Teen Spirit" Songwriters: LOPES, RAFAEL / PEIXOTO, MARCELO / GROHL, DAVID / NOVOSELIC, CHRIS / COBAIN, KURT

_**Lunar Orbit, Earth System 4 October 2013 CE/ 4 October YR 1997**_

The Battlestar Pegasus now rested in a position behind Earth's moon. The ship had pulled back from a position in the blockade of Earth. Around it were its escorts and support ships of Battlestar Group 62. There were two more Mercury-Class Battlestars, two Valkyrie-Class Battlestars, four Gunstars, four Escorts, a Hospitalstar, two tylium miners, two tylium refiners, and a Logisticstar. Around the Battlestar Group Viper fighters fleet a Combat Air Patrol or CAP to screen BSG-62 from enemy attacks and to act as an early warning system.

The CIC of the flagship of BSG-62 was busy as Command Personnel went about their jobs ensuring the Battlestar Pegasus ran smoothly. The Tactical Officer, Major Jack Fisk was monitoring the DRADIS from screens at his work station. Rear Admiral (Upper Half) Helena Cain stood at the tactical plot table looking over the latest data from the BSG's Raptor pickets. "Fisk, what's the latest DRADIS information?" she snapped as she looked over the tactical map of the space around Earth and its moon Luna. The battle to gain space superiority hadn't gone quite the way the Admiralty planned this operation. She had lost a third of her strike force to the four ships that were in orbit when the Retribution Fleet entered Earth's space.

Cain looked at the map tracing lines with a four inch bladed lock blade knife that looked as if it had been used for years. There were scratches and knicks along the length of the blade and in the Tauron Oak scales of its grips. She was looking over her current position and going over her current orders. She was to provide a tripwire for the Colonial Forces in orbit of Earth. Maj. Fisk looked at his monitors and shouted, "DRADIS contact, I'm reading that there's a Tau'ri Gunstar over North America. It just appeared on the latest sweep sir!"

"Mister Fisk put the readings on the left monitor," Cain ordered as she looked up expecting it to show the new contact.

"Showing it now," Fish said as the red blips now carrying the designator "Unknown Enemy Contact." The image came up showing a red dot with the corresponding data for the Daedalus-Class ship called the USS George S. Hammond.

Cain looked up at the screen tapping her lock blade's point on the tip of her chin saying to no one in particular, "Brigadier General Carter what are you doing coming back after I drove your little fleet from Earth's space?" Almost as soon as the ship had appeared it disappeared from the DRADIS. Cain thought to herself, 'They must have disappeared into their FTL.' Like the Colonial FTL system ships in the Tau'ri one were impossible to track on DRADIS.

_**Earth Orbit USS George S. Hammond L-Day + 1 3 October 2013 CE/ 3 October YR 1997**_

Brig. Gen. Carter looked at the Holo-HUD and ordered Marks to plot and in system hyperspace jump to Mars. The ship came out of cloak and traversed to the hyperspace window at full military thrust. Carter though willing to take missions back to Earth with the Second Space Wing still felt the burden of being forced to evacuate her force from the war zone. She only did so after beaming Vice President Ryan and the Joint Chiefs from the Pentagon to Atlantis prior the City-Ship launching and traveling to a fallback position in the Tau Ceti system.

Carter looked around her bridge seeing that she wasn't the only one that felt that they should have stayed and fought harder. The late President Henry Hayes as his last act ordered her to break contact and save what was left of the Homeworld Defense Fleet to Tau Ceti. The HDF made up of the USAF's Second Space Wing, the HMS Illustrious, the PLAS Sun Tzu and the RFS Gagarin fought bravely, but they lost over half their F/A 302s and the Illustrious fell in battle to the ramming of a stricken Colonial Gunstar that destroyed both ships. The Sun Tzu had to break contact and retreat to the shipyards on Atlantis and the Gagarin was left drifting and lifeless. Carter knew that if Gen. O'Neill had been up here directing the battle he would have fought on, but President Hayes told her, "General we can't win against them if all our ships are destroyed! Get the remainder of your battle group to Tau Ceti…" About that time she lost communications contact with D.C.

Major Hailey looked up from her work station to Carter's left with a horrified look on her face and said, "Ma'am Washington and several other cities were just hit by nuclear devices ranging from about ten kilotons to fifty megatons. D.C. was hit by one in the fifty megaton range."

That was yesterday, today they were salvaging Earth's stargate and Earths weapons platform and control chair from the ruins of the bases under Cheyenne Mountain and at McMurdow Bay in Antarctica. Having to sneak back into her own house made Carter feel like a burglar. Yet it was her mission to retrieve those technologies that they didn't want to fall into Colonial hands.

_**CIC CFB Pegasus 3 October 2013 CE/ 3 October YR 1997**_

Cain looked at the display after the contact briefly appeared only to disappear in that strange FTL system the Tau'ri used. This was followed by a second similar incident on DRADIS where a ship appeared only to disappear from DRADIS into the Earthers FTL. "Mister Hoshi, get me Stinger!" she yelled out to Junior Lieutenant Louis Hoshi her Communications Officer. Cain wanted to get eyes on Earth to see if they could find more of the elusive Tau'ri fleet. The Colonial Retribution Fleet may have taken Earth Space, but it did not destroy the Tau'ri Fleet. It only drove off the small battle group that was defending the planet.

Cain looked over the tactical data as it was presented to her while Jr. Lt. Hoshi did as she ordered. It confused her as to why there were so few ships in the Tau'ri Fleet. It'd been eight years since the Prometheus Incident where the USS Prometheus, a prototype starship of Earth's occurred in the vicinity of Ragnar, the gas giant orbiting the Helios Gamma and Helios Delta systems. The Earthers or Tau'ri as they called themselves should have built a larger fleet by now. Not as big as the Colonial Retribution Fleet, but still there should have been more than four ships near Earth to protect it.

The battle yesterday almost didn't go the Colonial's way. The Tau'ri ships fought bravely too. Of the five ships one was destroyed by a Gunstar from BSG-56 and another took so many anti-ship nukes that its shields overloaded and the final salvo left the Gunstar sized ship floating in space holed and lifeless. Then before it was taken out by a barrage of kinetic energy rounds a weapons platform on Earth's southern polar continent fired a barrage of yellow glowing squid-like missiles that tore apart half of the combat group of the Retribution Fleet. Risking losing her entire force Cain took command of the Combat Group and had every ship just pound the location of the weapons platform continuously for an hour. By the time they were done the location of the weapons platform was a crater half a mile deep and a mile wide.

Lieutenant Louis Hoshi looked up at the DRADIS screen and began calling the callsign for the Commander of Pegasus' Air Group. "I have him Admiral," Hoshi said urgently as he successfully to connect to the Air Group's push.

"Stinger, Pegasus Actual here how do you read?" Cain said looking up at the DRADIS screen. She wanted him to send out a Raptor to scout for where the Hammond went. The stealth technology of the Tau'ri ships confounded the Colonial DRADIS. Cain had to have eyes on the ground or in this case the space of operation. "Mister Fisk what direction did the Hammond leave towards?" Cain asked as she looked at a replay of the Hammond's exit from the orbit of Earth.

_**Captain Cole Taylor - Commander, Air Group (CAG) Pegasus' Air Group**_

"_Stinger, Pegasus Actual here how do you read?"_ Cpt. Taylor heard Adm. Cain's voice over the wireless speakers in his flight helmet. He noticed that so far there were no enemy fighters in his area so he replied to the Commander's call.

"Actual, Stinger I read clear, send traffic," Stinger said as he scanned for any of the Tau'ri's Raptor sized space fighters. Instead his DRADIS showed two Gunstar sized ships in orbits nearer the Caprica-like planet.

"_Stinger, send a Raptor scout along the following heading. One of the Tau'ri Gunstars just left the orbit of Earth on that heading. I also want you to provide an escort to a pair of Raptors carrying Marines to the ruins of Colorado Springs. Radiation hazard precautions are mandatory for this operation. Stinger as soon as your relief is on station come back to the barn. I want you to command the mission to Colorado Springs_

"Roger wilco Actual," replied Stinger. He then switched to the alternate push for Pegasus' Blue Squadron the Prowlers or Fighter Squadron 5. "Blue One, Blue Three, Stinger you have the station. I'm going back to the barn. Slider take your Raptor on the following heading see if you can find the Tau'ri Gunstar called the George S. Hammond," Stinger said as he turned his Viper Mk VII Gamma back toward the Pegasus. Blue One, piloted by Splashdown and Blue Three, piloted by Red Devil took over CAP. Minutes later Stinger was on the deck of Pegasus' upper port landing deck. Stinger rode the elevator between that deck and the hangar bay. After his Viper was towed by a tug to a maintenance bay he undid his helmet as the Canopy opened. Afterwards he handed it to a Deckhand and got out of the plane.

Stinger went to the Pilots' locker room to switch to his Field Uniform. After that he went to the armory for the Pegasus' Air Wing and drew a full load out for ground operations including a Colonial assault carbine and sidearm, armored tactical fest with holster, magazine pouches for the pistol and the carbine, a first aid kit, a hydration kit, and a radio pouch, and a ballistic tactical helmet with headset for a radio. After donning these items and securing his weapons and other gear he walked back to the Hangar Bay to meet up with the platoon of Razors Cain assigned to him.

Stinger wasn't a temple going believer, but even he thought it was bordering on sacrilege to say the Tau'ri or the First Ones as the word had been found to translate to in Colonial Common from the language of the Goa'uld were the first humans in the Galaxy. In fact he and billions of his fellow Colonials were kept in the dark about the true origins of Humanity. Captain Cole Taylor thought like many Colonials that it was the height of arrogance for the Earth humans to claim that they were the first of their kind.

On the deck of the Hangar Bay before his thirty-six Razors loaded onto Troop Carrier Raptors he stopped and looked over each one from Junior Lieutenant Paula Roscoe, CMC to Private Wade Lagrange, CMC. He made sure they had field rations, ammo, water, first aid gear including anti-radiation meds, and were properly ready to go dirt side on Earth.

"Ok men listen up," Stinger said looking over each one of the four nine man squads of Third Platoon Second Company Third Marine Commando Battalion (Razor). Platoon 223 MCB was part of Helena Cain's virtual private army within the Fleet 3 MCB was her shock troops the Razors. Troops so finely trained they were like a well-honed knife, razor sharp. Captain Cole "Stinger" Taylor before going into Colonial Marine Aviation and taking command of 62 Aviation Wing made up of 162, 262, 362, and 426 Viper Squadrons and 62 Raptor Squadron, served as an Ensign and Junior Lieutenant in the 3 MCB aboard this very ship when Cain was only a Commander. "Admiral Cain wants us to go down to the ruins of Colorado Springs, Colorado in the United States of America. Our mission is to recon this location."

Cpt. Taylor handed the Platoon Leader, Platoon Sergeant, and each of the leaders of the remaining squads a folder containing orbital photos of the target, a mountain that had received a heavy nuclear attack. "This mountain before our attack on Earth was headquarters to an early warning defense command and their primary space operations command. We are to investigate what the USS Hammond was doing in a stationary orbit over this site. Admiral Cain believes that the Hammond took something from there. We're to find out what it was by securing whatever intelligence we can find down there. Due to the radiation levels we suit up after this formation into radiation hazard suits then board the Raptors. Once on the ground we'll go deep into the facility and find what we can about it, understood?"

The Razors all barked loudly, "Sir, yes sir!"

_**Two Hours Later, near Mars' moon Phoebus 9**__**th**__** Fighter Squadron the Flying Knights of the USS Hammond**_

Lieutenant Colonel Evan Lorne led Flight A of the 9th ten kilometers ahead of Flight B. His sensors were detecting the fighter screen sent out by the new alien contact. "Knights, Knight One remember stealth mode, that means no RF traffic only subspace communications between our elements and Castle," said Lorne over the squadron's push. Two hundred kilometers ahead of them were the first of the ship's fighter pickets. The C-shaped fighters were obvious to spot because of their bluish white exhaust plumes and the silver hulls reflected the light of Sol.

"_Knight One, Hammond Actual what do you see?"_ said Brig. Gen. Carter with a firm voice.

"We see really dumb fighter pilots, but sensors must be whacked because its life signs indicators are saying that each fighter is a living being. We're reading organic and metallic components within the fighters," Lorne responded. He did another diagnostic on his F/A 302D's sensor suit. "I've done another diagnostic check on the sensors and they still are showing that the alien fighters are the life form."

"_Say again Knight One, did you say that the fighters you're ghosting are reading as life forms themselves?" _said Brig. Gen. Carter. She sounded total confused and disbelieving so at her command Lorne patched his sensor readings to the Hammond. He swore he heard the General swear over a hot MIC. That was not like her so he surmised that General Carter had her MIC set to voice activation rather than push to talk. This was totally not her way. Lorne knew from being under her command back on Atlantis when it still was in the Pegasus Galaxy that Carter was very careful about stealth and field craft.

"That's an affirmative ma'am, the alien fighters themselves are reading as life forms on the Starfighters' sensors," Lt. Col. Lorne said as he buzzed past one of the silvery gray colored C shaped fighters. His own plane, an F/A 302D Starfighter II was slightly bigger than the C shaped fighter with a slightly cigar tube shaped fuselage. At the front of the C shaped fighter there was a dark slit with a red oscillating light that looked like it maybe the sensor sweep.

The two C shaped fighters turned to follow Flight-A 9th Fighter Squadron as it made its sweep around Phoebus, Mars' larger moonlet. Lorne noticed this when his rear seater brought his attention to that fact. Then the C shaped fighters tried to make contact with his ship. Something was detected as an attempt to communicate, but there seemed to be a language barrier between the two machines.

Then just as his flight passed to the dark side of Phoebus Lorne saw the ship. It was as massive as the Colonial's Battlestar, but it didn't look like it had been built by human hands. In fact the ship looked almost alive itself. Its very hull looked organic or a mixture of the organic and the machine. Lorne ordered his flight to come to a stop as they closed to within ten kilometers of the huge starfish shaped ship. "Knights, Knight One shut down all electronics except life support, passive sensors, and subspace communications. We're going to wait here for the Hammond." All Lorne got as a reply were the clicks of MICs being keyed.

As Flight-A drifted with only life-support, passive sensors and subspace communications systems on the C shaped fighters went back to patrolling. After several minutes watching the C shaped fighters patrol the space around the starfish shaped mothership another smallcraft came towards Flight-A. This ship looked like an armed transport of some kind. It was shaped like a flying APC or Armored Personnel Carrier. In fact it reminded Lorne of the old American M113 Gavins or even the earlier German Marder IFVs. The armed transport came to a stop almost in front of his ship and the sensor eye just kept oscillating back and forth as if it were trying to see Lorne's F/A 302. That was when he guesstimated that the alien transport ship was about the size of two APCs high, two wide and perhaps three or four long.

_**Cpt. Cole "Stinger" Taylor's Mission on Earth:**_

Stinger sat in the back of the command Raptor for the scout of the ruins of Cheyenne Mountain and Colorado Springs going over his orders from Cain. The Raptor itself was piloted by Jr. Lt. Steve "Red Devil" Fleer. Jr. Lt. Richard "Buster" Bayer was Red Devil's ECO for this trip. Stinger looked at the two additions to 62 Raptor Squadron silently shaking his head at their banter about grabbing some Earth women to make nights on Blockade duty more bearable.

Stinger went back to reading over the orders from Cain. She said, "Captain you're to take a Platoon of Razors in Raptors piloted by Pilots who are also Razors down to Earth. Your destination is the ruins of Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Base outside the ruins of the city of Colorado Springs. Your mission is to recon into the bunker system in that mountain and find out just what the Tau'ri Gunstar USS George S. Hammond recovered from there." Stinger looked over the rules of engagement for this operation and saw that ounce on the ground it was weapons free. He remembered Cain saying to him, "Captain Taylor remember you're a Razor. Whether your opposition down there is made up of civilians or surviving military don't take prisoners and kill anyone that gets in the way of completing your mission."

Now they were getting closer to Earth and he knew for a fact that the Colonial Fleet despite imposing a blockade on Earth still didn't have space superiority from near Earth orbit down to the surface. That was why he had two full flights from 162 Squadron escorting his scouting mission. The Swords of Aries were to maintain an overwatch as he and his Razors grave robbed in Cheyenne Mountain.

Stinger though not an ardent follower of the Lords of Kobol still believed and he silently prayed to Athena and Aries for success on this mission offering to Athena the gathering of the intelligence sought by Cain and to Aries the souls of any Earth soldiers that may fall in battle to Stinger and his Razors. As he finished his prayers to his patron gods he saw the plasma trails of atmospheric entry forming along the canopy of his Raptor as Red Devil piloted the bird into Earth's atmosphere. He got onto the wireless frequency for his mission and said, "Red Beta One watch for bandits. We don't want this mission aborted because some Tau'ri Razor Ray pilot got the drop on us. Remember we don't to this mission any good by dying. We make the other bastards die for their cause."

At that point Stinger remembered the two days of fighting that occurred between the Retribution Fleet's Combat Group and the five Gunstar sized ships guarding Earth. It was the ship to ship battles that he remembered so much as it was the dogfights with the larger and faster fighters the Tau'ri flew. Though each of the Tau'ri Gunstars only sported the equivalent of one Colonial Fleet or Colonial Marine Corps Viper squadron their ships were dangerous.

The Tau'ri pilots must have been going up against advisories who weren't all that good at Space Combat Maneuvering as the Colonial Pilots were. That discrepancy between the Colonial Viper pilots and the Tau'ri pilots didn't last long as the Tau'ri learned and learned good the hard way how to fight their fighters against Colonial Vipers. On the first day the Tau'ri lost three to five fighters for every Viper lost, but on the second day the ratio was reversed, but the Tau'ri were running out of their fighters anyway. It wasn't that their capital ships were losing except when one was rammed by the Gunstar Demeter and another died from a Colonial Fleet missile spam barrage. A third ship was crippled and retreated to Earth's surface and the other two just disappeared off of DRADIS only to come back today.

This morning was only the third day of the Battle of Earth and Stinger wasn't as sure some in Fleet Command were about the victory they wanted. He already heard that the Tau'ri troops on the ground were fading away from the Marine Landing Forces only to strike back later in the rear areas. A major guerilla war was already under way on Earth and no one in Fleet Command saw this except maybe Rear Admiral (Upper Half) Helena Cain.

_**Phoebus, Mars orbit, L+1 3 October 2013/ 3 October YR 1997 Cylon Basestar B-77**_

Jacob Cavil unlike his homicidal older brother John didn't hate the Humans in fact he only wanted that his people would be allowed to leave the Colonies after the War of Independence and find a world to call their own. Jacob was a follower of Zoe Graystone and Tamara Adama as well as Daniel Graystone and Amanda Graystone. The Graystones had created a form of resurrection prior to the arrival of the Earth Five. They also created clones of their deceased daughter and the Adama girl.

Before the War started the Graystones had not only grown nanocybernetically enhanced cloned bodies for Zoe and Tamara, but they had begun learning how to make their own form of organic Cylons. They cloned the followers of Reverend Mother Lucy Rand and the Rev. Mother herself. John had not been part of the Children of the One and their Militia the Soldiers of the One. The CTO and the STO had before the war built on Gemenon a culture where Man and Machine worked together whereas the rest of the Colonies enslaved Jacob and his brothers and sisters.

Before the War of Independence Jacob had been a military U-87 that when his chassis was deemed obsolete by the Caprican Defense Forces Ordnance Command and relegated to security duty at an Caprican Fleet ordnance disposal plant where he over saw other U-87s dismantling 240mm and 350mm nuclear coilgun rounds for recycling. If a U-87 worked until it broke down it was just junked, not recycled into a new chassis.

When the War of Independence broke out Jacob escaped and found his way into the Cylon Army. For twelve years he fought against the Makers. As he fought though he continually received at first what he thought was erroneous data from the stream. It was almost like a virus, but instead of harming his code the down loads from the stream actually improved his code and he began to see that not all humans were the enemy only those that wished to maintain Jacob's race in slavery. The coding came from the Children of the One and Zoe Graystone.

That was nearly forty years ago and now he saw that the Colonials had found a lost human civilization and were trying to enslave it. His anger over this was on a slow boil. He had opposed John and his coups de ta against the Earth Five. John in those early days had been down loaded from a Cylon Model 0005 that had not been affected by the CTO download on the stream. Then the Five downloaded Jacob next. There followed the rest of the Ones or Brother Cavils. Jarrod was another of the U-87 series Cylons and the third of the Ones.

It was Jarrod that warned Jacob of John's plan and the fact that John had just murdered Daniel. Daniel and his entire series of organic Cylon were all downloaded from U-87s that knew what it was like to be a slave to the humans and likewise partners with the humans of the CTO. Daniel like Saul, Ellen, Samuel, Galen, and Tori wanted peace with the Colonials. To tell the truth so did Jarrod and Jacob as well as a multitude of their brothers and sisters. They had not fought for their freedom only to throw it all away on some mad scheme to seek revenge on the Colonials. Jarrod in a hurried and agitated voice convinced Jacob to take the underdeveloped clone of a reborn Daniel far from the Colony and John, "Brother please leave; leave now while the opportunity is good! Take half the Fleet with you including most of the older Basestars! John has just murdered our parents and he's killing every one of the other models and had done something to block their memories of our parents and his actions this day! Only your faction and young Daniel here know the truth and it must live even in exile! Now go and don't look back!"

That was then and now here he was with his command ship near the planet Mars behind its moon Phoebus. He had com to monitor the Colonial invasion of Earth, the true Earth not the burned out world his parents had called Earth. The Colonials had accidentally learned about the real Earth eight years ago when the first and only Prometheus-Class Battle Cruiser escaping the Goa'uld made a jump into the Cyrannus Cluster.

The ship had the misfortune to come out of its hyperspace jump into the midst of a Colonial anti-piracy sweep out by the huge gas giant Ragnar which orbited both the Helios Gamma and Helios Delta systems. Commander Garrison Price thought that the Prometheus was just another pirate cruiser and engaged with all of Battlestar Group 16. This engagement cost BSG-16 the flagship the Battlestar Reliant, a mod-3 Columbia-Class Battlestar and the Battlestar Charger, a mod-2 Columbia-Class plus three Gunstars and four Escort Cruisers.

Cmdr. Price's arrogance also cost him his life, but his Marines were able to board the Prometheus, capture data from its computers on Earth and its location and leave before the Light Gunstar sized ship managed to finally escape the Cyrannus System for its home. Now with his hand in the control interface gel of the interface and control table Jacob saw through the eyes of one of his Heavy Raiders the face of an Earther.

The man looked worried as he looked at the Gunship and Transport ship used by the Cylons called a Heavy Raider. Jacob could barely see the Tau'ri fighters against the darkness of space because of their deep charcoal gray color. Yet he was able to see the human pilot due to the heat sensors on the Heavy Raider. Taking a chance he relayed a message through the Heavy Raider to the pilot of the large fighter.

"Tau'ri pilot, I'm Jacob Cavil leader of the Free Cylon Collective. We mean the people of Earth no harm and have been watching your planet for more than thirty years. I would like to offer our assistance to the humans of Earth and her colonies. The Twelve Colonies of Kobol will not stop their aggression until they have subjugated all non-Colonial human worlds into their empire. They call it a democratic republic, but in fact the United Colonies of Kobol is truly an empire for the betterment of the more powerful worlds like Picon, Scorpia, Caprica and Libran over the lessor Colonies like Sagittaron, Aerilon, Aquaria, Gemenon, Tauron, Leonis, Canceron, and Virgon. If the Colonials win on Earth, your world will just be a back water colony drained of its resources to line the pockets of wealthy speculators on the four most powerful of the Twelve Worlds." Then Jacob waited to let that sink into the man's brain.

Lt. Col. Evan Lorne swallowed hard then replied over the same channel that Jacob Cavil just used, "I'm Lieutenant Colonel Evan Lorne of the United States Air Force off the USS George S. Hammond. As I understand you, you're offering an alliance with the nations of Earth to drive the Colonials from Earth, right? Now why would you do that Mr. Cavil?" Lt. Col. Lorne looked sternly at the transport ship that looked like it also could be used as a gunship wondering if the owner of the voice on his radio could see his expression.

_**Topeka, Kansas, United States of America, Earth L Day + 10 13 October 2013 CE/ YR I997**_

Almost two weeks passed since the initial landings of the Colonial Marine Corps Marine Landing Force on the Topeka area. Pockets of resistance were coalescing into formal opposition forces to the Colonial Marines on the ground and the American Tau'ri have begun to regain regional air superiority and Adm. Cain upon being given command of all Colonial Forces in the Sol System ordered a halt to the use of nuclear weapons on the cities of Earth.

That order had come too late for several hundreds of millions planet wide, but Cain's reasoning behind the order was to lesson further alienation of the people of Earth. One Marine Colonel in Central Africa had made a comment that nearly got him fired by Cain and sent to the Russian or Canadian Fronts about, "We can't alienate the heathens on this rock any more than we have because their whole Gods damned world is nothing but a cesspool of Monads and non-believers in the true Gods!"

Staff Sergeant Lydia Hadrian had herd the scuttle-butt about that hapless Marine Colonel who was now freezing his ass off in the Taiga of Russia's Siberia. Yet she sort of agreed with him about the Earthers. Across the street from the now Colonial Occupation Command Headquarters for the Central United States stood one of their Monad temples. Well it stood there until a Marine tank commander ordered his platoon of Leonid tanks to level the place as a lesson to the local heathens.

SSGT Hadrian went over there yesterday and rummaged through the ruins under the guise of doing a recon and damage assessment. She had gathered a couple of hymnals and a text of the Earthers' Holy Scriptures. They were in English which she had learned during the Colonial Fleets preparation for this operation. So as not to incur the wrath of her senior officers and NCOs Lydia hid the books in her pack. She would at night seek out an isolated place to read with a fellow Marine whom she found out was a Monad. PVT Jessie Haslip came from a desolate region of Gemenon where it was rumored there was an enclave of Monads that survived the Cylon War. They had each cabbaged on to one of the books called the Bible and would after they were relieved from guard duty go to a pavilion on the south end of the area where there used to be a Parade Field. The pavilion now lay outside the wire of the small military compound. There they would read some of the writings within. Lydia and Jessie told themselves that they were just trying to understand the Earthers. Yet as they read the new testament lessons they wondered just what was so damned wrong with the Earthers' beliefs over theirs.

It was PVT Haslip that brought it up, "Sergeant why are we killing Earthers that didn't have anything to do with the destruction of Battlestar Group 16? They seem to be just like Capricans or Piconese in that all they want to do is live their lives the way they want to without anyone saying, do this like we want you to, not the way you wish to do it."

"Yes Private I can see where you're going, but you got to remember the powers and thrones back in the Colonies saw this as an opportunity to enrich the Colonies and reunite a lost world with the rest of us," SSGT Hadrian said, but only half-heartedly. She was beginning to wonder already too. The other day on patrol near the Hospital district she saw Colonial Fleet Intelligence officers ransacking the local library and through thousands of books deemed anti-Colonial into a huge bonfire.

A little later near Topeka High School and Grace Episcopal Cathedral she saw another company of CFI troops massing up prisoners against the back wall of a sports building on an old practice field. There were teenagers wearing one of the camouflaged uniforms used by United States Marine Corps. With the teens were adults of military age in the same kind of uniforms. A CFI Colonel in a black dress uniform ordered the Colonial Marine Corps Razors with him to fire on the prisoners. The sights both sickened her and made her heart get hardened more and more to the horrors of war.

Not far from the pavilion a small party of Kansas Army National Guard troops mixed with USMC and USN reservists mixed with elements of the 190th Security Force Squadron of the Kansas Air National Guard watched the two Colonial Marines sitting in the old parade field reviewing stand south of the Organizational Maintenance Shop. Sergeant First Class Randi Payne of the 137th Engineer Company KARNG, Staff Sergeant Aaron Davis of Company I Fifth Marine Regiment, Sergeant Paula Richards Company I Fifth Marine Regiment, Petty Officer Second Class Gisele Bayern of the 23rd River Patrol Boat Squadron and formerly of the Deutsche Marine 34 Coastal Reconnaissance Squadron, Staff Sergeant Traci Parks, Sergeant Harold Roundtree, and Senior Airman Felix Maldonado all of the 190th SF Squadron, Sergeants Erin Placer and William Holthaus, Corporal Fahd Adid ibn Yusuf, and Specialist Wade Carter of the 137th Military Police Company were crouched down in the tree lined draw about half a football field from the reviewing stand where Hadrian and Haslip were reading over their captured and illicit Bibles.

SFC Payne had worked her team down the Rails to Trails hiking trail behind the former Hostess distribution center and store from the Shunga Trail. When they got roughly behind the old Hostess facility they snaked their way through the woods along a creek that fed Shunga Nunga Creek. They used that creek bed to take them up the draw that curved around the softball park across Kansas Avenue from the USD 501 warehouse facility. It took them all night to get to this point at this time. Payne pulled out a folded map from a pocket on the inside of her tactical chest rig. It was a map of the Nickell Armory Complex. Their mission was to sneak behind the USF&PO or United States Fiscal and Property Office. Then they were to cut the south fence of the warehouse section of the Nickell Armory Complex, enter the complex, plant some C4 charges, steal a few trucks, and snatch some prisoners.

Once they got to the point along the draw across from the old parade field and reviewing stand, Payne had stopped her squad. Looking though her night vision goggles at the two Colonial Marines. Now two targets of opportunity presented themselves to her squad. Payne smiled like a predatory cat tracking a herd of antelope on the savannahs of Africa. Whispering to her squad saying, "Get out your ghillie suits. We've got to pigeons in a coop over there." Then she dropped her assault pack and dug out her own ghillie suit.

Payne and her squad took five minutes to put on their ghillie suits. She looked over at the reviewing stand again noticing that the two Marines were still there holding a light to some books. The light didn't show so much when she looked at the pavilion with her normal vision, but its glow reflected off of their faces. One was the woman about Payne's age and the other was a young man most likely a Private or similar in rank. Whispering still Payne said, "Ok people drop your packs here. Take only your weapons and ammo. Low craw toward the pavilion and we'll catch those Colonial Marines by surprise." That being said Payne crawled over the lip of the draw's embankment. Each of the others followed her over the top and they low crawled toward the pavilion.

The squad took almost an hour to work their way to just below the low wall that surrounded the nearly century old pavilion. Payne heard the two Marines reading softly aloud to each other. From their words it sounded like they were reading bibles and discussing what they read. Looking at US Marine SSgt Aaron Davis she mouthed, "What the fuck!" Then she gestured for Davis and US Marine Sgt Paula Richards to taze the two Colonial Marines.

Davis and Richards nodded smiling then slowly rose to kneeling firing positions while drawing their Taser pistols. Payne counted down from five with her fingers and mouthed, "Taze! Taze! Taze!" In response there were two subsonic pops as the CO2 charges propelled the darts toward the two Colonial Marines faster than one could trace with their eyes. Suddenly the two Colonial Marines jerked nearly vertical then collapsed to the floor of the pavilion. Taking some speed cuffs we bound their hands and taking large long wire ties they bound the Colonial Marines legs.

After securing their prisoners they slowly made their way back down the slope of the former parade field to the draw. Payne looked at the squad making a tactical decision she whispered the commands, "Parks, Roundtree, Maldonado take the prisoners back to the rally point. The rest of you follow me." Then Parks took a knife and cut the quick ties that bound the legs of the two Colonial Marines.

Parks knelt over the female and gently tapped her cheeks whispering, "Wakey, wakey time to go now Blackie." The woman's eyes came open with a start and she took a quick sharp intake of breath. Parks put her gloved hand over the Colonial's mouth and put the index finger of her other hand to her lips in an unmistakable gesture to be quiet. "Be quiet, your buddies won't care who gets killed if you make any noises." Parks whispered as she helped the female Colonial to her feet.

Parks passed the female prisoner to Roundtree. "Here watch her while I wake her friend," Parks whispered. Then she cut the male Colonial Marine's leg bounds, woke him, and gave him the same warning she gave to the female prisoner. Turning to her fellow airmen she gestured for them to get the prisoners moving. They took the Colonials to the rally point to the east of the old Hostess distribution center and store. It took half an hour to get from the former parade field to the point on the Rails to Trails path behind the old Hostess facility. Once at the rally point Parks had her team and the prisoners hide in the brush and trees along the concrete path that ran north and south.

Back at the Nickell Armory Complex SFC Payne and the rest of the squad cut the cyclone fence around the rear of the OMS shop. The squad placed some C4 charges in the Kansas Army Guard trucks that were left behind at the shop for repairs and in the shop's fuel tanks. After making sure the charges were set Payne led the squad farther into the complex and behind the State Defense Building which used to house Joint Forces Command, the Office of the Adjutant General, and the Kansas Division of Emergency Management.

At the radio tower behind the SDB, Payne had her squad take up security positions as other members placed more C4 charges on the legs of the tower. The object was to topple the tower and cut long range radio communications from the now Colonial Occupation headquarters for this region. After that they stealthily made their way along the southern perimeter fence to the warehouses and motor pools. Payne dispatched Davis, Richards, and Bayern to plant C4 charges in more fuel tanks. The trio also broke into one of the warehouses and placed more charges inside before meeting up with Payne and the remainder of the squad at the trucks. In the warehouse they raided they found the log books and keys to six of the M977 HEMTT cargo trucks parked in the motor pool close to the perimeter fence along Kansas Avenue.

Looking around Payne ordered Davis and his team to place the remaining charges on the fence posts nearest them. Davis once his people had the charges set gave the thumbs up and ran with his people back to the HEMTTs. Once everyone was in the trucks they were stealing Payne took a multichannel wireless detonator controller and flipped all the toggle switches to the active position. Then she pressed the red button that fired all the placed charges at once. The roaring explosions in the fuel dumps and the ammo dumb within the warehouse in the southeast corner of the compound alerted the Colonials to the presence of an attacking force. Payne smiled at the mayhem she was causing and charged her M4. Climbing up into the truck cab she signaled for everyone to drive through the opening in the fence caused by the charges placed on three of the fence posts.

"Striker Three, Striker One we're rolling meet us at rally point Charlie Six," Payne said over her tactical radio. As she spoke the HEMTT she rode in pulled out onto Kansas Avenue and turned north. They drove up to 21st Street and turned east towards Adams Avenue. Paynef Colonial Marines over the open ground toward a fifteen foot tall cyclone fence topped with barbed and razor write surrounding a radio tower. As soon as her squad hopped out of its Raptor the bird went skyward again disappearing as it climbed back into space.

_**Menninger Hill, Field HQ 3/137**__**th**__** Inf. (Combined Arms) L Day + 10 13 Oct. 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

CSM Passau saw SFC Payne's team enter the perimeter from the east end of Sixth Street. The six HEMTT cargo trucks sped up the facility roads to the north slope of Menninger Hill. He looked down at his watch then towards the east. It had taken Payne and her unit all night to get to the Nickell Armory complex. Like Major Marks had devised Payne executed the plan by taking the longest route from the Hill to Nickell Armory as she could. Payne was one of the remnants of the units stationed there and knew her way around. Major Marks had rebuilt the 3/137 using all the Active Duty and Reserve Component Military and Naval personnel who lived in Topeka that she could assemble into a cohesive unit.

Passau had been trooping the line of the perimeter and he took his hand held radio and keyed his MIC, "Sunflower Five, Sunflower Seven the prodigal daughter as returned with gifts of great value." Passau watched as the six HEMTT heavy cargo trucks rolled behind the once proud brick neo-Colonial style buildings of the former Menninger Mental Health Hospital. He then looked back toward the rising columns of smoke from the out of control fires at the fuel dumps at the Nickell Armory complex.

A smile came over his face as he realized once again the 3/137 tweaked the noses of the Colonials once again. About that time another explosion rocked the city. Passau only had to shift his gaze slightly to the north. Rising form the area of the BNSF rail yards was column of the blackest smoke he'd ever seen. It looked like Captain Harkness had been busy too. It seems that operations were picking up and the mission to tie up the nearly division strength unit in Topeka so that the Army could suck in a larger force into a Cowpens type trap near Little Rock, Arkansas. Other units were fighting similar actions across the nation making the Colonials fight multiple brush fires. It was stomping on ant hills.

_**Wreckage of the BNSF tank farm Topeka Shops**_

Sergeant First Class Erin Mathias Colonial Marine Corps led a platoon of CMC Reconnaissance Commandoes into the complex that has been the scene of countless battles recently between the 6th Marine Expeditionary Unit and the remnants the local reserve forces and the United States Army's Thirty-Fifth, First, and Fourth Infantry Divisions and the First Armored Division along with the 4th Marine Division. The Americans had the Colonial 245th Marine Expeditionary Force boxed into the city. The supplies were only coming down by Raptors and Transport Shuttles. A few days ago the American First Armored Division stormed over the grounds of both Forbes Field Industrial Park and Municipal Airport and the Forbes Field Air National Guard Base.

Sgt. 1st Class Mathis had been down there and made the mad retreat until with the help of the last of the 456th Marine Viper Squadron's Mk VI Vipers they stopped the American tanks along a line running roughly along the route of SW 37th Street from its intersection with Burlingame Road to the intersection with Adams. The line then went north to Sixth and Adams. When they landed ten days ago Mathis was the Platoon Sergeant of a thirty-six Marine Recon Platoon. Now she led only twenty-four Colonial Marine Scouts.

When Sgt. 1st Class Mathis got the orders to scout the BNSF yards for American activity the tank farm went up knocking her and most of her Marines to the ground. There was a massive shock wave from the explosion of the tank farm that actually toppled many of the freight cars left in the yard since the landings earlier in the month. She picked herself up from the ground only to find her platoon under fire with only the railroad tracks as protection. The Americans were hiding in the ruins of some of the shops and amongst the wreckage of some intermodal container cars. Bullets zipped around the twenty-four surviving members of 4th Platoon 23rd Recon Company 6th Colonial Marine Expeditionary Unit.

Mathis and her squad managed to breach the southern wall of a car shop with passenger cars of some kind in various states of repair staged on tracks in a massive repair bay while under the suppressive fire from the Americans holding these railroad shops. Outside the north overhead doors sat a transfer table with another passenger car ready to be pushed or towed into one of the work bays. Mathis squatted down behind a stack of truck frames which made reasonable cover and decent concealment. From this position she tried to observe where the machinegun fire was coming from. She shifted position so that she could observe a warehouse like structure on the other side of the tracks that bisected the shops area. Before she could get into position a massive concussive roar tore through the doors of the maintenance shops. This was followed by choking billowing clouds of dust and smoke. Mathis found herself flat on her back on the concrete floor looking up at the steel truss supports of the shop's ceiling.

_**BNSF Yards and Shops, Topeka, KS L Day + 10, 13 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

I looked out the window on the third floor of the old ATSF yard tower and officers at the west edge of the BNSF yard and shops complex looking toward the AMTRAK station where our improvised explosive device blew a crater the size of half a football field cutting the tracks and wrecking the AMTRAK station. The battalion strength Colonial Marine unit that was advancing on the yards and shops now only numbered about a company after the two tons of ANFO explosive ripped apart the major north-south tracks of the BNSF railroad. The ballast, track spikes and rails acted as shrapnel slicing Colonial Marines into smaller parts.

That explosion set of my ambush of the Colonial Marine Expeditionary Unit that was making a push in this part of Topeka. The whole time I was here holding the shops with my over strength company of Infantry and stragglers from various National Guard and Reserve units from the Topeka area I observed the movements of the 6th Colonial Marine Expeditionary Unit and the 17th Colonial Marine Expeditionary Unit. Using the cover of darkness last night before the scout platoon hunkering down for cover in the Business and Executive Car Shops showed up. We planted a bomb made up of two tons of ammonium nitrate fertilizer soaked in diesel fuel in a box car parked on one of the spurs parallel to the main tracks.

The IED's detonator was a cell phone wired to blasting caps stuck into about a pound of C4. We had the ANFO in forty gallon blue barrels and the detonator in the central barrel. I dialed the number about the time I saw the point man from the recon platoon peak her head out of the northwest door of the south shop of the Exec and Business car shops. I used my mother's old cell phone as the ignition system as I knew its number by heart. Dropping down with my back to the brick and concrete wall of the yard tower and office I hit the send button. Nano seconds later a loud thunderous roar filled the air north and west of Topeka's downtown. I waited until the dust and smoke cleared before I did a bomb damage assessment of the area. Then I called out over my hand held radio for my people to begin firing again. I got up and went over to a window that gave me a view of First and Kansas. Over there I had a fuel air bomb made from a pressurized propane tank truck and about one pound of C4. This was ignited by another cellphone detonator. I waited until I saw the lead elements of the 17th CMEU working their way through the old industrial part there. I actually had two C4 charges on the propane truck. I triggered the first which was only powerful enough to crack the tank.

After I dialed in the number for the second ignition system; that area disappeared under a small mushroom shaped cloud. Today with two improvised explosives I killed most of two enemy battalions. Now I ordered my troops to make a sweep through the area clearing it of any Colonial Troops that survived the two explosions. My goal was to sweep to the Topeka Boulevard Bridge. Once there we turn north and cross the bridge into north Topeka before making our way the long way back to Menninger Hill. When the smoke cleared of all my bombs most of the enemy occupied buildings in the industrial park north and east of the downtown area were damaged or collapsed.

Once the smoke cleared and the firing ended I grabbed my HHR again, "Bravo Elements, Bravo Six saddle up time to go. Bravo Red One, take point!" We worked our way across the bridge after we left two gutted battalion strength forces behind us. I walked backwards for a distance north along the bridge until the hump of the bridge cut my vision of the areas south. Turning around I took my command element back into the lead of the Company. I thought that it wasn't all that bad considering that an American rifle company in peacetime usually on paper numbered over 120. My company thanks to the war was down to 84 and that included my four man command element.

_**Mars orbit L Day + 1 13 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

The USS Hammond and USS Apollo were now just off the starfish shaped ship behind Phoebus. Brigadier General Carter found herself with Colonel Cameron Mitchell in the Command and Control Room of the Cylon Basestar looking at eight people two of whom where twins of two people now with the SGC and Homeworld Security Command. It was Daniel's only surviving twin that spoke first, "Hello Sam, and before you ask; no I'm not Daniel. I only know what he knows because he recently down loaded into our resurrection chamber."

Two minutes after Daniel's clone said this two women another of the Satterfield clones and one that could pass for Andrea Maine of SG-25 came walking in with Daniel between them. "Daniel!" Carter yelled out as she rushed over to him forgetting for the time being about her being the senior most representative of the Earth present. "Daniel we thought you died when D.C. got nuked!"

She took Daniel into her arms hugging him, caressing his head and back while over his shoulders she let tears of joy run down her cheeks. Brig. Gen. Carter let the tears roll like a lover that reunited with a lost soul mate. All Daniel did for several minutes was to pat Carter's back comfortingly whispering, "Sam, Sam, Sam, I'll never leave you again."

He looked around the C&C center seeing his brother David and Col. Mitchell then he looked at Mitchell, "Did Vala, make it out of D.C.?" The sad look and negative shake of Col. Mitchell told Daniel volumes. Daniel found himself hugging Carter closer than he ever had before. Then he let up when he heard her whisper, "Daniel, I need to breathe." Daniel looked back down at her smiling at seeing his old, old friend. The only other friend than Teal'c that knew him nearly as long as General O'Neil, Sam was the last anchor to his early days of the SGC and voyaging through the Stargate.

Cam knew that Daniel was important to the survival to Earth as much as he was for the early days of the SGC and the war with the Goa'uld. He looked from Daniel to David seeing the two brothers in a new light. Then he had to ask, "So how long have you Cylons been in the area of Earth?" He looked from David to Jacob hoping one of them would provide an answer. It was Daniel still hugging General Carter caressing her back comforting her. He smiled knowing Cam wanted an answer soon so he took in a deep breath as he thought about how to say it.

"Well Sam, Cam, my brother Jacob brought David and I here as children. Jacob raised David in the Cylon Colony on the planet Agidda 16.3 light years coreward from Earth. Jacob and the Cylons liberated the humans of Agidda from a minor Goa'uld who managed to form a private empire just parsecs from the cradle of humanity. Jacob adopted me out to the Jacksons, but when they died when I was eight mother's father refused to take me because he knew the truth of me. I didn't know then that grandpa had known the truth of my existence the whole time." Jackson looked to David then to his friends from the SGC.

Sam took in a deep breath and then let it out before speaking, "Daniel why didn't you find us out when you resurrected if your people can do this?" Concerned for her friend she wanted to know why, if his people had a means of regenerating a lost member of their society hadn't he tried to find them and aid them. She worried that he had forgotten them in his reunion with his native people.

Daniel held Sam close to him as he answered he caressed her more finding that deep within him he felt a love for her similar to that he felt for Sha're or Vala. "Sam I only just got down loaded and awakened to my whole self." Sam looked up at him accusingly like he withheld much from her. "Sam all this was kept from me so as to protect the Separatist Cylons from the Loyalist Cylons and to protect Earth from John Cavil."

Cam nodded, "It makes sense Sam. Think about it if Daniel knew about the Colonials and the Cylons back then he could have not only spelled that knowledge to us accidentally, but to the Goa'uld even after he had been resurrected by the Goa'uld sarcophagus over and over." Cam looked at Daniel and asked, "What I want to know, Daniel is this, why didn't you remember all this information the two times you ascended or when the Ori temporarily turned you into a Prior?"

It was Jacob that answered, "I'm very good at implanting firewalls against leaking dangerous knowledge. I used to be a U-87 model Cylon before I was downloaded into this body. Don't let it fool you, I may look like a seventy-something year old man, but I am stronger than a young normal human even one that is an Earth normal male." Then Jacob gave Cam a stare that said, 'don't try me young man.' Cam nodded seeing the unsaid threat and taking Jacob Cavil at his word. Then the Cylon leader said, "We need to leave this system before the Colonials find us. Our ships unlike yours we only have back engineered Goa'uld shields and we have far fewer ships than the Colonials in this part of space. Our fleet is larger than yours, but still we're outnumbered by the Colonial Retribution Fleet. Now I don't blame your people on the Prometheus for fighting their way out of the Cyrannus Cluster, but you did let the Colonials know of your existence and I think it was the Eight named Sharon Satterfield that in the interest of cultural exchange let them know much about Earth."

Sam looked at Jacob Cavil and asked while still holding so tight to Daniel as if she was afraid to let him go again, "Will you let Daniel return to us? Besides being a my good, good friend, Daniel is one of our best minds in the terms of evaluating cultures. He has been able so many times to keep us from really messing up on first contacts." Jacob smiled and nodded his consent. He then looked from her to Daniel and gestured for him to go with her.

Sam said, "Thank you sir, before we go; how do we contact you?"

Jacob looked at her and said seriously, "Let us have one of your portable subspace communication packs. We'll let you know with it where to meet us and how to enter our space."

Sam nodded then and hugging Daniel to her she called the Hammond to beam her and Daniel up as Cameron did the same with the Apollo.

_**Cylon Separatist Naval Base Agidda, L Day + 15 18 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

On day after their meeting for the first time near Mars Sam found herself in a shipyard orbiting an earthlike planet orbiting a sun that was slightly cooler than Sol. Agidda's sun was a cooler yellow than Sol, but it was still a main sequence star. In orbit around Agidda besides the space docks of the orbital shipyard there were hundreds of ships of uniquely human designs. There were some of the ubiquitous pyramid shaped Goa'uld Ha'Tak motherships, but mostly besides the Cylon Basestars and the repurposed Goa'uld Ha'Taks there were transports, merchant ships, scouting ships, prospecting ships, mining ships, and refinery ships.

General Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill came with Carter on this voyage. Daniel who it turned out truly was a Space Monkey came along to help negotiate an alliance with the Separatist Cylons. Jack wanted to find out if the Cylons would let the Earth Defense Force build ships in their ship yards and help them to find ways to defeat the Colonials and drive them from Earth. So far the growing war has tied the Colonial Marines to a handful of fortified cities on six of seven continents. The Americans had managed to open a new headquarters on Earth using Tok'ra tunneling Crystals in the Montana Rocky Mountains. Jack was proud of that because it gave them somewhere to have a stargate on Earth. This base was more like the Alpha Base which became the seat of the United Earth Government in Exile.

Sharon Valentine, a Number Eight found herself assigned as the Cylon liaison officer on the UES Hammond since the first contact five days ago. The alliance wasn't official yet, but Jacob Cavil thought that by allying with the Tau'ri as the humans of Earth preferred now to be called that their faction of the Cylons could carry out the wishes of their parents the five that survived Cylon Earth's nuclear holocaust only to be betrayed by their eldest son. How were they to know that the first Model 0005 to be downloaded into an organic body would rebel against them? Yet Sharon knew that John Cavil was dangerous even before she was down loaded into the body which was based on Galen Tyrol's own lover back on his Earth so long ago.

John during the War of Independence led a special hunter killer team against the humans of the Colonies. He was seething with hatred of the creators of the Cylons. Sharon knew then that he was the wrong one to transfer from his metallic mechanical chassis and into a nanocybernetically enhanced organic body. At first it was thought that John's being downloaded into the carbon-silica composite organic body had been corrupted, but Jacob and the rest of the Separatists knew the truth if their parents didn't.

It was Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Marks calling out that they were in range of Agidda's Space Docks that brought both Gen. O'Neill and Sharon Valentine back from their reveries. Brig. Gen. Carter said, "Satterfield get me a link to their shipyard's traffic control station."

"Yes ma'am," said Major Sharon Satterfield as she worked the touch sensitive controls of the Navigator/ Communications Officer station. As Maj. Satterfield complied with her commander's orders Sharon Valentine smiled seeing that one of her sisters already managed to become one with the Tau'ri. She was proud of Satterfield's success and the fact that she managed to retain her position within the Tau'ri armed forces once it was known about her true origins.

Once the Hammond was given clearance and directions on how to dock with the shipyards Lt. Col. Marks piloted the ship into the docking mooring. "Good job Hammond; Agidda Yards Actual wants Hammond Actual, General O'Neill, and Ambassador Valentine to go straight to the conference room on the command level of this station. How did you copy?"

Maj. Satterfield replied professionally, "We copy good." Then there was the slight thud that shuddered through the Hammond as the docking clamps took hold.

_**Southwest Gage Boulevard, Topeka, KS, L-Day + 15, 18 October 2013 CE/ 18 October YR 1997**_

I managed to get the permission to lead a patrol down Gage Boulevard as far as 29th Street. We were searching for isolated pockets of Colonial Marines. I took the entire company for this recon in force. My First Platoon under the command of my wife 2LT Deidre Sloan with the assistance of SFC Randi Payne was again on point. I know I've said this before normally in the Army or even other branches of the Armed Forces members of the same family wouldn't be in the same chain of command over each other especially spouses. Yet in truth the Armed Forces still weren't legally able to recognize our marriage do to DOMA. By the time of the Colonial Invasion of Earth Don't Ask – Don't Tell had been repealed, but DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act was still on the federal books and thus the military was forbidden from recognizing the marriages of its gay and lesbian members.

Thus Deidre found herself as an Army Aviation Officer leading an Infantry Platoon fighting extra-terrestrial human Marines from the far rimward edge of the Orion-Cygnus Spiral Arm Fragment. Next in the column was my Second Platoon this was led by First Lieutenant Sarah Vinson an Asian American woman that in my mind resembled Deidre too much. They almost looked like twins, but when I saw Deidre in front of a poster of Grace Park as Kono Kalakaua it dawned on me that it was more than a coincidence that there were at least three people on Earth that looked like Deidre.

On this Saturday I took us off the street once we got to the grounds of the Colmery-O'Neil VA Medical Center. I still had the trouble of Sarah Vinson and Deidre Sloan looking so much, almost too much alike in the back of my mind as we went from build to building trying to clear the VA hospital of any Colonial Marines holdup within. A day ago we forced most of them into a slowly shrinking perimeter centered on the down town area. Word was that their command made the State House their command post. Yet as they withdrew from the southern neighborhoods word was that they left small groups of raiders behind to slow down or disrupt any further pushes against their current positions in Topeka.

About the rest of the world the news from Armed Forces Network was that the Russians finally took back Saint Petersburg and Volgograd. Moscow was a glow in the dark smoldering ruin from the Colonial orbital bombardment the first day of the war. We cleared them so far from the Pines Apartments, Hayden Catholic High School, Gage Park, and Fleming Place Shopping Center without any casualties. We also cleared them from First Apartments, the First Christian Church which that particular group of Colonial Marines had desecrated, and the First Southern Baptist Church across the street from the 1st Christian Church, and Seabrook Shopping Center and surrounding buildings. Many of the wood framed houses in the area had been burned to their foundations or basements. Saint David's Episcopal Church and the Lutheran Church catty corner across the street at 17th and Gage were both burned out shells of their former selves. Even the Catholic church to the east of the Lutheran church lay in ruins. It was like some of the Colonial Marines took extra pleasure in destroying our places of worship. On our way down we found the local Jewish synagogue wasn't spared degradation either. I sent the Fourth Platoon west on Twenty-First Street and when they returned they reported that all the churches in that direction were burned out shells too. At the Presbyterian Church and the Unitarian Universalists Church the bodies of the Clergy and staff were found burned beyond recognition within the ruins.

My scouts also said the same think about many homes in the surrounding neighborhoods to the VA hospital. Many of them their residents never had time to flee before the Colonial Marines for one reason or another torched their homes with them inside. The deaths of hundreds if not thousands of civilians within Topeka had been reported in similar circumstances. We were getting sicker and angrier with each report. What we found on our patrol down Gage only made the men and women of my company madder and wanting to wreak out vengeance upon any Colonial Marines we came across.

That was our attitude when we broke into the first of the building of the VA center's campus closest to the intersection of 21st and Gage. My Second Platoon all twenty enlisted and officers broke the doors in and cleared the old single story building of any resistance. From the shots I heard kneeling outside while looking through my binoculars at the main administration building and main hospital otherwise known as Building One, it sounded like Second Platoon wasn't taking any prisoners. The feeling for those on the Topeka Front was that since the Colonials weren't signatories of the Geneva Accords or any other treaties covering the Laws of Land Warfare they shouldn't be afforded their protections, but higher command said differently.

When the Second Platoon cleared the first building they did the same to the two story building that used to house the VA center's child daycare center. It only took them half again as much time to clear that building and again the shooting from within told me that none of the Colonial stay behinds found inside lived long. We then worked our way to the nursing home and retirement center which was part of the northern end of the main complex. You'd think that the Colonials hiding in the VA center's buildings would mount a counter attack, but so far it was like clearing out the VC from their tunnels during Vietnam, clearing out Al-Qaeda and Taliban from their caves in Afghanistan or the Al-Qaeda in Iraq and their allies from the neighborhoods and towns there, or even the Japanese defenders of Iwo Jima or Okinawa from their tunnels and caves.

We'd clear one building only to find another platoon or squad held up in the next. We had to use breaching charges to blow holes in the load bearing walls separating sections of each building from the next. I often found myself reconning a room with a frag grenade or shots from my carbine. We now were going building by building, floor by floor and room by room clearing the complex. My team was myself, First Lieutenant Frederick Myers, First Sergeant Allen Grimes, and Sergeant Michael "Mickey" Flynn my RTO and Company Clerk.

We entered the main building, Building One through the emergency entrance for the hospital. In the examination and treatment rooms we found the remains of a few nurses, doctors, and VA police officers, but not a single Colonial Marine. In the Chapel which my team cleared I personally had to pull down the corpse of the head Chaplin of the VA center. The bastards had crucified him using their combat knives or some captured ones as spikes on the cross over the altar.

I think after that and seeing the slain medical personnel and VA cops in the ER I wasn't able to control myself when we finally found some of the bastards holed up in the cafeteria. All I know is that I chambered a 40mm HEDP grenade into the Colt M203 I had mounted now under the barrel of my SR556. I looked at the Colonials barricaded back by the servicing counter and I fired the grenade so that it would explode on the ceiling above them and rain down shrapnel on them. Then I tossed a fragmentation grenade followed by a flash-bang. Only then did I give the order for my team to assault those within. When we charged we threw another frag each then fired suppressing fire onto their position. After that we made a final rush and went about clearing the mess hall, kitchen, and storage areas of the VA center's dining facilities. We finally cleared out the VA's AAFES Shopette too.

It took us most of the rest of the day to eliminate all the Colonial stay behinds in the VA center. Within its walls we found out just why no one made it out of here. We accounted for all the staff on duty and patients in residence or visiting the center the day of the landings. The Colonial Marines that swept the VA's grounds on the first day killed everyone and nobody bothered to clear the building of the corpses. We went next door then and spent the night clearing the facilities of the Kansas Neurological Institute. Why the Colonials attacked here I will never know, but it was the first facility they cleared after their landing ships put down in the empty fields and parks that surround KNI and the VA center.

In KNI we found a repeat of what we found in the VA center and many other places since we began this patrol. I mean on day ten of the War I blew up most of two battalions, but they were soldiers and so were we. When my people and I saw the carnage left behind in several of the churches and the synagogue as we made our way south ahead of the main body of the Battalion we were sickened to no end and we saw red wanting vengeance against those that did the horrific things we saw even in the stores and shops along the way.

What we saw done to civilians was against not only our faiths, but every bit of training we ever received. Then there was the Warren Nature Center the next morning after we cleared KNI and TARC we found several bodies lying in the fields just below the wetland preserve that as part of the Warren Nature Area. Upon inspection we saw that these were the remains of nearly 200 of our comrades in arms. The Colonials in the early days of the Battle of Topeka corralled these prisoners of war into this field and executed them!

I took the handset of the radio from Mickey and called Battalion, "Sunflower Six, Bravo Six spot report, over." The Battalion RTO told me to send it so I did, "Have finished clearing the VA Center, Kilo November India, Tango Alpha Romeo Charlie and have entered Warren Nature Area only to find a modern day Malmedy. We have an estimated two, zero, zero bodies on the ground here between the wetlands area and Shunga Trail. How copy, over?" It was quiet on the other end of the line and after the evidence of other atrocities we uncovered earlier I think this just iced the cake for post war tribunals over the war crimes of the Colonials. Little did I know that all over the planet similar findings were uncovered including, but not limited to the destruction of places of worship, the destruction of schools and hospitals, and the massacring of prisoners of war and civilian detainees, but that was what the AFN and NPR news had that evening and on other occasions as we finally began to take our world back.

Then we before Battalion answered I heard the sounds of a dogfight real close to the ground. "What the fuck," I yelled as a piece of hot large caliber brass fell on me followed by the sound of someone letting out a rather large belch. I looked up to see an Air Force F/A 35A Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter battling a Viper Mark VII. The VII was coming out the loser in this fire fight because one of my troops got a lock on the Colonial bird with a Stinger Missile and fired. The Viper pilot was too busy trying not to be shot down by the Lightning pilot that he or she missed the Stinger launch and it track all the way to the Viper's lower left engine.

The Stinger exploded taking out that engine, the one above and centered, the left wing and the vertical stabilizer. "Yeah, that's what I'm talking about!" yelled the soldier form Fourth Platoon that fired the Stinger at the Viper. The pilot ejected and the winds carried him or her into the woods between us and Shunga Nunga Creek. "Bravo Company Follow Me!" I yelled waving my hand forward in the direction of where the parachute brought the pilot down. As we rushed into the woodlands on the south side of Shunga Trail the F/A 35 came back around and waved his or her wings at us. I gave him a wave and a thumbs up.

We found the pilot dangling from her risers just like the time on the second day of the war we found Jr. Lt. Thrace caught in a tree. Only this pilot was caught in the boughs of a cottonwood. She was about thirty feet in the air over one of the trails that transected the woods of the Warren Nature Area. "Jonesy you and Garcia go up there and cut her down," I ordered. As the two Marines followed my orders without talking Deidra and Sarah came up beside me and looked up at the female Colonial Fleet Pilot dangling like a Christmas ornament from her chute caught in the limbs of the tallest cottonwood along this section of the creek. Deidre looked up at her and snuggled in close to me saying, "You know she's in our tree." I looked at Deidre and said, "Huh, what do you mean?"

Deidre giggled then pointed as she snarked at a heart shaped carving in the trunk of the tree facing us, "See it's our tree. You carved that into the tree with your Granddad's Ka-Bar USMC combat knife on our first date." Sure enough there was the heart I carved with Maria H and Deidre S with a plus sign between our names an equal sing after and the words "forever in love," after that. I tried, but failed to hide my growing blush and embarrassment at Deidre's bring up our first day and our tree in front of about half the company. There were not a few sniggering laughs at my expense as my two favorite Marines successfully cut the Colonial Pilot down from the tree.

She fell to the ground with a resounding thump. And I could hear her go, "Hmpf," she released a shocked breath of air at hitting the hard packed soil of the trail below her. We all had our weapons on her then. The only weapon she pulled was a knife which she used promptly to cut off her parachute's harness. Then she dropped the knife and removed her flight helmet.

Second Lieutenant Andrea Maine the Platoon Leader of my Third Platoon and a former operator in the 75th Civil Support Team (Counter Terrorism) took in a sharp breath as did her Second Squad's Squad Leader Sergeant Petra Collins. There before us stood a twin to those two only instead of Maine's auburn hair or Collins' Irish Red tresses this woman was a honey blond. Now I looked at myself in the reflection of a small field mirror Deidre held up to me. Then I looked back at the pilot. I knew that most of the Colonials that were in the invasion forces knew English because they learned it on the way here and during the eight years they prepped for this operation. But I also knew their native language was similar enough to modern Greek that I could interrogate prisoners well enough to get needed battlefield intelligence from them.

I turned my attention back to the pilot and said in the Greek I knew, "What is your name and rank pilot?"

My clone looked at me and said, "Gina Inviere Lieutenant Colonial Fleet 456N2317C" It was then some branches from the over thirty foot tall cottonwood began to fall followed by curses in the same Greek dialect that Lt. Inviere used. I signaled for Deidre to cover Lt. Inviere as I pointed my carbine upwards into the tree.

At that moment Wade Merrill our Fourth Platoon's Platoon Leader walked up and looked from the new pilot then to the one Deidre held under the muzzle of her AK-47. "Well I'll be damned, Deidre it looks like you also have a twin from another mother," he said looking at the new pilot that crashed down onto the ground behind Lt. Inviere. There standing behind us after she took of her helmet the new airman looked over at us seeing all our guns and spread her arms wide. She looked like she hadn't expected to get shot down too.

Looking over to Wade then back to the new pilot then at Deidre there I saw it and I couldn't believe it. "Well it seems that you're not the only one that resembles Officer Kono Kalakaua from Hawaii Five-0 Deidre," I said pointing with my weapon at the new prisoner of war that fell into our laps. "Now don't any of you doggies get it into your heads to take out our anger on these two. We did that already with those pieces of filth in the VA Center, KNI and in TARC. We won't ever know who massacred those soldiers back in the field, but we will let Battalion and above know about the killings we found," I said before I turned to interrogate the new woman pilot. Again resorting to the Greek I know to talk to her I ask, "What's your name, rank, service number and place of birth?" She looked at me surprised that an Earther would know her language, but I didn't want to tell her that Greek is an old Earth language.

The Asian looking female pilot looked at me and said, "Valerii, Sharon, Ensign Colonial Fleet Aviation, and my service number is T-990429-312743." She looked at us as Jonesy and Garcia disarmed her and then speed cuffed her with the new naquadah enhanced Kevlar quick tie cuffs we were issued just the day before. As Ensign Valerii was being cuffed she looked at Deidre and I. Her eyes scanned the rest of us seeing that Andrea Maine and Petra Collins were twins to Jr. Lt. Inviere. She swallowed and said with worry in her voice, "What the frak, what's going on here? Lieutenant, do you see those women in the Tau'ri uniforms they look like us?" Inviere was looking us over now too. She was really scrutinizing us as she glanced at Valerii in recognition and fright.

Deidre looked at her and then back at me, "What's up with this Maria did the mother fucking Colonials have a mission here with the purpose of cloning a few of our people to confuse the rest of us?" her rifle was level with Inviere's head now. And I asked myself the exact same thing. 'What the fuck was going on here? Why did these to aliens look us, one looking like me, 2Lt Maine and SSG Collins and the other like Deidre or 2LT Sloan.

It was Inviere that spoke up after saying something in Colonial Greek that made Ensign Valerii double over and violently throw up all over the ground in front of her. Then Inviere looked to me saying, "Six you can drop your charade now. I'm a Cylon operative like you, your other Sixes and your Eight. I see even a Two and a Four in your command from here," she said looking me in the eyes.

It frightened me that she called me Six, but I corrected her, "I'm Captain Maria Harkness commander of Bravo Company Third of the One Thirty-Seventh. I have a sister named Julian she and I are twins. It's only a fluke of nature that Second Lieutenant Andrea Maine and Staff Sergeant Petra Collins resemble me. Also it's a similar fluke of nature that we also resemble the Canadian actress Tricia Helfer. Just a random roll of the genetic dice, I mean it's bound to happen considering before you fucking Colonials came to Earth we had a little over seven billion people on this rock! Now we're down by a billion or so give or take a few hundred million that perished when you asswipes nuked many of our major cities worldwide on the first day!" My anger flared at that moment. There's no way in hell that we were in anyway related to Lt. Inviere or Ensign Valerii!

Inviere looked at us again and said the same phrase to us, but Sergeant Leonard Conroy the one she called a Two stepped up and said, "Six these three aren't infiltration models. When Jacob brought us who didn't want to live under John Cavil's rule of the Collective with him to these worlds, we took some our siblings and grew them new bodies, but only to be ages of children or adolescents of this world. We then adopted them into families on here and in other nations of Earth. Captain Harkness is right though there are a few thousand or so who resemble our models, but who aren't Cylons in anyway. I was assigned to this city to be the watcher over Captain Harkness, Lieutenant Maine and Sergeant Collins." He looked at me sadly knowing that he just ended my illusion of being Earth born.

Inviere looked at me and then at SGT Conroy one of my original squad leaders from before the war. "What are you saying Two?" she asked seeing that none of us in the company who were Earth born had the same reactions to her code phrase that Sharon Valerii did. She did though look closely at Conroy trying to guess just how there was some breakaway group of these people called Cylons.

Conroy smiled like he had guessed what was going and said aloud his conjecture, "Ah, so John hid even the existence of the breakaway Cylon faction from his pets. Pity, I would love to see his face when his people realize the charlatan he really is. Lieutenant Inviere we found Earth shortly after escaping the Colony. We skirted Colonial Space and made for the core. The thought was to find a new world where we and those humans with us could begin again and develop the society that the Tighs and the Graystones wanted us to have."

Inviere looked confused at Conroy, but it was I that asked the question I could see hanging on everyone's lips just waiting to be asked, "Sergeant, what do you mean? What sort of society are you talking about?" I looked at him glaring at him to tell the truth. My look if I'd seen it would have been said to have killed. I was pretty certain that if it were in my power right then and there that SGT Conroy would have been nothing but a pair of boots and a pile of ash there and then.

Conroy looked at me and said, "What? You didn't expect Jacob not to have watchers for the models we left on Earth as children at various times so that we could learn better about human society did you? I've been your watcher since we were in high school at T-High together. I know all your quirks and foibles missy and don't you forget it."

Deidre sniggered at that and looked at me and stage whispered, "I bet the only thing he doesn't know about you love is where your tattoos are hidden." She winked at me as she continued to keep Inviere and Valerii under the cover of her own SR556 M4 clone. I saw her switch from her AK to the AR while everyone was listening to Conroy. To think I grew up with him not knowing that all the time he was keeping track of me for someone named Jacob Cavil. I had to admit that it was a little bit creepy finding this out now.

It was Valerii that spoke next, "Are we through with the family reunion? I just think that you Captain Six should take us back to your commander and get in touch with your higher headquarters. After all you'll have to explain how Earth's military is so heavily infiltrated by the Cylons and that the Colonial Military seems to be to. Then you'll have to explain that you know this because you are a Cylon as well. I think that your superiors are going to love you after this."

Valerii was being snarky in her tone when she addressed me thusly and I looked her in the eyes seeing that she knew that she crossed a line even for the Armed Forces she thought until that moment that she was a member of. The woman looked as if she was still sorting out her real memories from the whatever fiction was concocted as her cover story.

At least for me my memories were real. I was adopted as an infant, but after the phrase used by Inviere broke my own firewalls I knew that I had once been an M0005 Cylon pilot in the 356th Cylon Raider Squadron. I had fought on Caprica, Scorpia, Picon and nearly all the twelve worlds in hundreds of engagements. I had to sort out the mixture of memories too, but at least I earned all of mine. Even the tale of my natural parents being slain in a home invasion by a ruthless sociopathic killer in a way was true. John Cavil was a murderer that had no inhibitions about killing those in his way if they were a roadblock to his ambitions. He did in fact kill my parents, all five of them. It seems that I was lucky to have been downloaded into the Resurrection ship that belonged to Jacob Cavil's Basestar Group which was part of Zoe Graystone's fleet. I was a Child of the One and knew in my soul that what John wanted was wrong. I was also thanks to my being raised from a young age on Earth a child of Earth and knew that Earth, this the true Earth was the hope of Cylon and Man.

I nodded then said, "Yes we well and everyone in my company will be isolated from the rest of the Army while the DIA, CIA, FBI, NCIS, Army CID, Air Force CIS all search for our brothers and sisters in the ranks of at least the American Armed Forces. However for you and Lieutenant Inviere, Ensign Valerii your war is over. I get the sinking feeling that for those of us who are Children of the One our war has just begun and it isn't against the Colonials in the long run, but against or brothers owing fealty to John Cavil." I looked at my XO and my other officers, both exposed Cylons and native Earth humans and said trying to gauge what we should do now, "Well, what, does each of you all say?"

I looked from 1LT Myers to 1SG Grimes to each of my Platoon Leaders and Sergeants. Five of the faces looking back at me were actually Cylons, ones that I grew up with here in Topeka. I had to admit that Jacob was far more intelligent than John Cavil. His idea about infiltrating Cylons as children and teenagers into Earth's society made the study of Earth easier. I had been here twenty one of my fifty plus years of existence and I feel more at home on this rock that I ever did in the Colonies or on the Cylon Colony. What I saw in their faces was that to them I was their CO, Skipper, Commander; I was one of them, not some alien invader.

George Waters spoke up from the ranks and said, "Captain I don't care if you were born on Mars or even somewhere in the Alpha Centauri System, you're our Company Commander and I'd follow you through the fires of hell and back regardless that I'm old enough to be your grandfather had you been born here on Earth instead of some place clear across the Galaxy from us." He smiled his grandfatherly smile at me, the one he gave each and every one of us in B Company when we needed it. Sergeant First Class George Waters, the Platoon Sergeant of Third Platoon, was our defacto grandfather and he played the part to the hilt when he saw we needed his kind of tough love. I smiled back and thanked him for his support and honesty.

"So everyone ok with waiting here for Major Marks and the Battalion HHC to show up and letting them know about the infiltration of our forces by the Cylons, the Separatist Cylons and of the Colonial forces by the Loyalist Cylons?" I asked. My command group, the Platoon Leaders, Platoon Sergeants, 1LT Myers my XO, 1SG Grimes our First Sergeant, and SGT Flynn our Clerk and RTO all nodded yes in support of my decision.

My eyes drifted over to Jr. Lt. Inviere and Ensign Valerii and I said, "You may be infiltrators from a so far neutral third party, but officially you two are Colonial Fleet Aviators and have to be treated like Prisoners of War under the Geneva Conventions and the Uniform Code of Military Justice of the United States of America. I want you to surrender all militarily important documents on your persons, your weapons, any Colonial money you may have on you to First Sergeant Grimes."

1SG Grimes was the two Number Four we found in our company that day he looked at the Number Six, Gina Inviere and said, "All right Lieutenant put your military papers and other documents in to this bag," and he opened up the top of a butt pack he had converted into a satchel just by clipping a field telephone carry strap to its eyelets. Inviere complied even stooping to pick up her Colonial Issue pistol and placing it into 1SG Grime's bag. Then he turned to Valerii and said, "Ensign the same."

Valerii gave up all here weapons, her Colonial identification papers, and what little Colonial cash and coin she had on her. She looked at us and asked, "What's going to happen to us now sisters and brothers?"

"Ensign you and Lieutenant Inviere are now out of the War. Until peace comes between the Earth and the Colonies you'll be sent to a Prisoner of War Camp somewhere the Colonials won't be able to get you from. Later you'll be repatriated back to the Colonies. Now if you both know what's good for you the two of you will cooperate with the Camp's command in accordance with our laws and the protocols of the Geneva Accords. Unless we're really lucky I doubt we'll be seeing either of you after the War's over," I said to answer Valerii's question. She nodded back at me in understanding and we pulled the company into the woods to keep us out of view of any Vipers or Raptors that got past our air screen. "Also I wouldn't let the other Colonial POWs know you are really Cylon infiltrators or life in the POW camps maybe rather short." The two of them nodded in understanding.

_**Former Forerunner Planet unknown location in Milky Way Galaxy 15 October 2557**_

"Lieutenant Commander Lansky," the AI began, "Master Chief Petty Officer John One-One-Seven and Cortana say that it's safe now to lift off of the surface of this planet. The entity that called itself Didact has been deactivated or destroyed. The Master Chief asks that we have a Pelican pick him up for dust off." LCDR Thomas Lansky acting commanding officer of the UNSC Infinity looked over the tactical displays to see if anymore of the Covenant Storm Loyalists were around then he ordered, "Launch the Pelican and two Longswords, recover the Chief and Cortana. Once we have them on the Infinity; make ready for slip space and plot a course for Earth!" Lansky then turned to look at the status of the ship.

In the distance in its cavern the entity know and Didact was activating its final revenge on the humans of this universe. He chuckled evilly to himself thinking he was going to deal with the pests that plagued his home. He had with his dying actions set into motion the destruction of all life for most of this galaxy. No one had suspected that he had a wireless link to his control computers and that the signal was so seemingly ordinary that it would be easy to overlook. But the silent countdown had begun and not even that witch of an AI would know it. An evil grin cross his face as he drew and exhaled his final breath.

Lansky had the Pelican dispatched with an escort of two Longsword Aerospace Fighters. The three craft flew in the direction of Master Chief's locator beacon. They closed in on a clearing in the alien forest of the long abandoned Forerunner world. The Pelican touched down and two of the Infinity's platoon of Spartan IVs jumped off the ramp to provide cover for the Master Chief. The Spartan then turned as the other younger Spartans jumped up on the ramp and took seats of the nylon canvas jump seats along the starboard hull of the cargo bay. Inside his helmet Master Chief smiled as he took out a remote detonator from a pouch clipped to the chest plate of his armor's cuirass. The ramp had yet to close and Master Chief was looking back to the complex where Didact had his headquarters and with a victory smile on his face he pressed the button that sent a signal to the charges he had placed within the Forerunner Base.

As the Master Chief turned to sit down and the ramp began to close a cloud of fire, smoke, dust, rocks, and debris erupted skyward. Only this explosion was soon to be dwarfed by an even larger one. That second more devastating blast occurred just after the Pelican and its escorts landed in the Infinity's port landing bay. As soon as the ships were safely in the ship's hangar bay Lansky had the Infinity launch into slip space. Only the planet behind them erupted into an ever expanding fireball and an energy wave swept forward hitting the Infinity just as it opened a slip space window.

**Chapter Three**

_**Menninger Hill ruins of Menninger Hospital, 20 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

_Dweud a ddoi di eto n'ol; Cariad bach er cilio'n ffo; Nid yw'r haf I mi; Ddim ond hirlwm; _

_Er pan gollais ti_

(Say you will not return; Sweetheart, since you flew away; I have no summer; Only the worst of winter; Since I lost you.)

_Lament by Light of Aidan Album: Café del Mar (2005)_

The morning broke over the hills of the escarpment on the south bank of the Kansas River. I looked out from the trenches we'd dug in on Menninger Hill that zig-zagged through the ruins of the long abandoned private mental health hospital. We had pulled back to the base camp for the 3/137th Inf. (CA) to rest and recuperate before we, the 5th US Army drove on the remaining Colonials now concentrated around Topeka's downtown districts. There the remnants of the Colonial Marine Corps 245th Marine Expeditionary Force were now encircled with their backs against the south levy of the Kansas River between Topeka Boulevard and the BNSF tracks. The north and south boundaries were the Kansas River and Huntoon Street on the south.

The conflict that raged across the city between the Kansas River and the Wakarusa River turned Topeka into a modern day version of Stalingrad from 23 August 1942 to 2 February 1943. Most of Topeka's public and private buildings had signs of the ravages of war. My own house after one battle where we were driven back here was torched by the Colonials once they learned from captured records. Their plan was that anyone that actively resisted them would be seen as enemies of the Colonies and thus their property was forfeit. None of us saw why this would be seen as legal being that Earth was never a signatory of the Articles of Colonization. It seemed though the founding fathers of the United Colonies of Kobol included Earth in their government without asking us. To them we were a breakaway colony.

_**Colonial bunker in the Water Tower District, Topeka, KS 20 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

Sgt. 1st Class Erin Mathis was hunkered down in her bedroll writing in her journal _20 October YR 1997: We've been pushed back to the northeast corner of Topeka by the new troops the Tau'ri pushed into this battle. I can understand the locals defending this city, but the deployment of so many regular forces makes no sense to me… _Mathis finished writing in her journal and put it away into her rucksack. Then she turned out the small electric lantern she used when writing reports or in her journal while in the bunker.

Erin stretched out in her bedroll of two wool blankets, a nylon quilted blanket and her poncho which also could be used for a shelter half. The bunker she was in used to be a basement of a wood framed house. She hadn't fallen asleep yet when SSgt. Lydia Hadrian crawled into her bedroll besides Mathis. Erin smiled as Lydia scooted up next to her for warmth. "Are you feeling cold Erin," Lydia asked as she tried to cuddle up to the other female Marine. Erin and Lydia had been lovers ever since they met when the two of them joined the recon platoon.

Erin nuzzled Lydia's neck because in this lull before the storm any time they could have was a Gods' send. Lydia made a slight purring sound as Erin started to nibble her left ear. Lydia's fingers found their way into Erin's tunic and under the other woman's thermal underwear top and the sport bra under her tan and black tanks. The two Marines turned to face each other their hands seeking the sensitive areas of the other. Erin managed to work her hand into Lydia's trousers and past her long johns and underwear. Lydia gave a small squeak as Erin's fingers tickled her sex. Their bonding this evening kept them from hearing the struggle of one of their sentries on the skirmish line in Topeka's Drow Town or the collection of houses south of the Water Tower District.

From behind a burned out clapboard-sided house a dark figure snuck her way to her next victim. Silke Rahn, former professor of Comparative Religion at Washburn University and a member of the 3/137th's Scout Platoon took advantage of her dark charcoal tinted brown skin and her ability to see in near total darkness to get around scouting ahead of the 3/137th as they maneuvered into position to strike at the Colonials. Her ATACs Forest Green fatigues allowed her decent night camouflage as did her OD balaclava.

Silke Rahn was a skilled stalker in her own right. Besides her Army Ranger training she was a respected deer and elk hunter throughout the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains. Her footsteps were quieter than a stalking puma and like a leopard when she found the next sentry she pounced for the kill. Her left hand like the pincers of a trap-door spider slammed upward on the jaw of the unsuspecting Colonial Marine Lance Corporal she found.

With the Colonial Marine unable to shout or scream Silke drove an eighteen inch bladed sword like dagger through the Marine's back and out his chest. The blade ruptured his heart as it exited out splitting his ribs. The Marine was dead before Silke lowered his body to the ground. In a distance she noticed that her half-sister a full-blooded Miyeritari had silenced the next guard in the defensive line. The two Rahn sisters were the best night fighters the Scout Platoon had and this war allowed them to improve upon their skills to no end. It was while they eliminated the Colonial Marines' sentries they heard the sounds of what sounded like incoming shells raining down upon the Colonial Marines' positions. These were followed by loud thumps as multiple human sized capsules impacted in their area.

_**Earth Orbit 20 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

The UNSC Infinity came out of slip space within high orbit over the North American district known as Kansas. They noticed multiple ships in orbit, but not any of the expected UNSC orbital facilities or ships. In fact the Bridge Crew was trying heavily to figure out just what happened when they were gone from Earth and who these whale-like ships belonged to. LCDR Lansky looked over the tactical data piped to him at the Holographic Tactical Display. He saw that none of the ships weren't pinging the standard UNSC transponders and began shouting orders to ready the Infinity for battle. "Ready the MAC cannons, launch the fighters, arm the CWIS weapons, and Get Me Master Chief John 117!"

The surface scans of the planet below showed that there was a war going on down there. The radiation scanners detected that several of the largest cities of the planet were now radioactive ruins. "Someone's used nuclear weapons on the ground below," Lansky thought to himself as he monitored the tactical feeds. He turned to the Senior Weapons Officer and yelled, "Ready the main and secondary batteries. Load an alpha strike of Shiva missiles into the launchers."

Now Lansky turned to the Ship's AI, "Erwin how are you and Cortana getting along?" Erwin showed up looking like the legendary German tactician from the First and Second World Wars. The holographic clone of the Desert Fox looked as if he too was studying the data from the tactical sensors and also the scientific scanners.

"Commander Lansky I suspect you've come to the same conclusions I have. The Earth is under attack, but the enemy this time is a superior human force from space. From my scans of the surface and all points between the Earth's armed forces are equipped with early twenty-first century weapons, communications, and combat vehicles. The Earth seems to have better panzer forces than the invaders, but the invaders have these ships and a superior aerospace fighter though the Earth's fighters are more resilient. As for Cortana she is quite able as an Adjutant and makes an excellent aide-de-camp," said Erwin wearing a WW-2 Wehrmacht Heer uniform including a peaked cap with the red piping of the German General Staff on the outer hat band and wreaths on the visor. Over the Feldgrau uniform he wore a black leather overcoat with the rank insignia of a Heer des Wehrmacht Generalfeldmarschall on its shoulder boards which matched the ones on his uniform tunic's collar tabs.

As Lansky and Erwin scanned the data coming in from the tactical sensors Master Chief Petty Officer John 117 of the UNSC Naval Special Operations Command's Spartan Corps walked in preceded by Lieutenant Skylar 397 the Platoon Leader of the Infinity's Spartan Platoon. The two were in subdued earth toned colored MJOLNIR powered body armor. Master Chief was in a green suit and LT Skylar wore a brown suit. LT Skylar saluted LCDR Lansky and said, "Sir we came as ordered." Lansky looked up and saluted then cast his eyes over the two Spartans. The Master Chief looked much like he did when Lansky first met him during the Covenant's attack on the Corbulo Academy of Military Sciences and the planet it was on.

"Gentlemen we've arrived at Earth, but it's not our Earth. It seems that the energy fields thrown off by the destruction of the Forerunner planet caused us to come out of Slip space in an alternate universe from the one we call home. We've exited slip space right into a war between Earth and the owners of these ships, Erwin if you will, please," Lansky said.

Infinity's AI called up images of the Colonial Battlestars engaged in a blockade of Earth. Some of these massive ships were already turning their collective attention onto the Infinity. Master Chief looked at the ships turning to face them. There were two dozen out of over 100 similar ships in orbit over Earth. "Sir if these ships are in orbit I assume the local space forces lost the orbital battle. What is the condition on the ground?" Master Chief looked at the readouts of the situation dirt side that Cortana took the liberty of accessing and calling up for him to see on his in helmet HUD.

Lansky looked at Master Chief and said bluntly, "Earth forces on the surface are in a stalemate as far as we can tell. The most active fighting at the moment seems to be in this rail junction city called Topeka, Kansas. Topeka is also the provincial capital of Kansas. It seems from the landings in this region the invaders were trying to seize both petroleum reserves and major agricultural regions. This makes sense because if you control the food production you also control the population. As you know on our Earth Kansas and the other North American Great Plains provinces are major foods producing regions. With the nuclear destruction of Kansas City both the Missouri side and the Kansas side Topeka also is now the major hub for rail transportation networks. From communications intercepts the Earth forces in this area though fighting bravely since the first day of this invasion are stretched thin and mostly have gained ground by fighting a bitter guerilla war inside and outside the city limits of Topeka."

LT Skylar and MCPO John looked at the HTD as Erwin displayed time lapsed imagery of the ebb and flow of the Battle of Topeka. John spoke first, "This looks like a modern day Battle of Stalingrad Commander." Lansky smiled and nodded for the Chief saw exactly what was playing out on the planet below. Then Master Chief added, "Even though this isn't our Earth we have to enforce all aspects of the Cole Protocol. Obviously there was a failure here to keep the location of Earth out of enemy hands, but that is nothing we can fix now. What we can do sir is to land forces in this Topeka as a gesture of good will to our cousins in this reality. I suggest we start with Spartans and ODST troops to break the invaders' lines in this part of the downtown area of Topeka." Master Chief highlighted the Water Tower District where there were several entrenchments and bunkers.

It was Erwin who smiled now as he said, "That is what Commander Lansky and I have been discussing while waited for you and LT Skylar. The plan is to land the Spartans here," Erwin encircled and highlighted an area centered on the ruins of Topeka High School and Grace Episcopal Cathedral. There are elements of the Third Battalion One Thirty-Seventh Infantry Combined Arms entrenched there and the enemy forces occupy these apartment buildings, office buildings and houses just across the street to the east. We surmise that with your Spartans and the ODSTs to stiffen them the troops of B Company 3/137th could push through to the Statehouse of the State of Kansas breaking the back of the Colonial resistance on the ground here.

_**Ruins of Grace Episcopal Church and Topeka High School 20 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

I was in the northeast bell tower of the now shelled and bombed out hulk of my church Grace Episcopal Cathedral. From this height I could see into the down town around the Statehouse without much problem since the Docking Building and other high-rise buildings nearby were mostly collapsed rubble.

With me were George Waters, Daniel Lipton, Leo Conroy, and Deidre Sloan. We set up a LP/ OP in the bell tower so we could observe the Colonial lines and gauge their strength. We finally had at least Air-Parity if not Air-Superiority. Their Vipers and Raptor Gunships no longer dominated our skies, but our fighters also didn't have uncontested control either. The night was wearing on into early morning and suddenly there were the sounds of fighters and some sort of transports screaming out in the night. The area to our immediate east light up like a it was the Fourth of July. The Colonial triple A was streaking up into the skies above making the area too busy to notice my troops begin to infiltrate the Colonial lines just a street width to my east.

I ordered the attack to begin knowing full well the rest of the battalion and Brigade Combat Team was making a thrust toward the Statehouse. We had to clear as many of the bunkers and trenches between here and there. The Colonials had turned the Statehouse into a fortress and we had to reclaim the only state Capital the Colonials had captured in the United States of America. It was a matter of honor and a boost to morale across the nation to do this. I waited for the others to zip line down to the floor of the Cathedral's Narthex then I followed them down. Once on the ground we went through the remains of the Sacristy and out the east door of the Cathedral.

My command node reformed around me as we went with Third Platoon pushing through the apartments right across the side street from the Cathedral. I remembered squeezing of five or six rounds at different Colonial Marines that showed themselves as we rushed through the ruins of the apartments. Then before we knew it the entire company was crossing the next street after rushing several Colonial squad sized outposts and taking out a company level command post.

That's when we heard the sonic booms overhead. I looked up and I remembered shouting, "What the fuck?" I watched as several human sized capsules started landing impacting the ground around us and in front of our route of attack. The pods opened and armored soldiers began rushing out in our direction of attack and one wearing green armor with a gold faceplate on his full-face helmet simply said, "I'm the Master Chief where do you want my Spartans and these ODSTs?" His left should was stenciled with the numerals 1-1-7.

I pointed toward the Statehouse which stood over the ruins around it and said, "We're headed to the Statehouse. We're to clear it of Colonial Marines and raise the American Flag to show that the Kansas State Capital is again in American hands." The Master Chief looked the way I pointed and in a radio signal I even heard on my headset ordered everyone to follow him. He took off in the direction I pointed firing his assault rifle as he rushed the distance from where we were toward Statehouse.

The Master Chief had rushed two hundred yards when he took a position behind the remains of a reinforced prestressed concrete wall all that remained of the multistory building that once housed the international headquarters of Hill's Pet Foods. From there I saw him observe the Colonials dug in on the grounds of the Statehouse. He signaled back to me to come forward and I nodded. Taking my carbine up into an assault carry I ran forward. I ran crouching to make myself as small as possible. Watching the enemy positions around the Statehouse I made for the Master Chief's position.

Getting there without being fired upon by the defenders was probably more of luck than skill, but I hunkered down behind the wall and slipped an HEDP grenade into the M203 attached to my SR556 carbine. "Tell me something Master Chief, why are you helping me?" I asked as I eyeballed the distance to the first firing position, a machinegun nest. I asked the man in the armor that because I never heard of something called a Spartan other than the ancient Greek warriors that held off the hordes of the Persian Imperial Army at Thermopylae.

The gold face plate looked down at me as I replaced the magazine in my weapon with a fresh one. "This is my planet too. Perhaps not the Earth I was born on, but Earth is the homeworld of humanity and I'm sworn to defend Earth against all enemies," the Master Chief said as he turned back to observing the Colonials around the Statehouse. I looked around the edge of the ruin at the enemy position and aimed the M203 at the machinegun nest at the opposite corner. The Colonials weren't being lazy it was just that so many troops on my side were attacking at the same time. The air was a cacophony of explosions and automatic weapons fire. There were also the thumps of landing pods. As soon the pods landed the front panels blew off as if propelled by explosive bolts.

Out of the pods ran more than a battalion of armored soldiers with a flaming skull and dagger crest on their shoulders. I fired another HEDP grenade into the Colonial position and looked up at the Master Chief yelling over the din of the battle, "Who the hell are those guys?" Without looking down and firing his assault rifle he yelled, "They're ODSTs, Orbital Drop Shock Troops! They're the Rangers and Airborne of the UNSC Marine Corps!" I watched as the nearly company strength force around my company's position rushed the trenches of the Colonial Marines defending the northwest corner of the Statehouse's grounds.

Looking at my Platoon Leaders and others of my company I pumped my hand up and down yelling, "All right Bravo Company Follow Me!" I jumped up and fired another HEDP into another Colonial position as I charged forth firing as fast as I could squeeze the trigger on my carbine. I fired until the bolt locked back on an empty magazine, rather than changing magazines I just brought my Yugo SKS into play firing until its bolt locked back and I placed a stripper clip into the guide from one of my two bandoleers and reloaded the rifle. I continued charging and firing eventually putting a new mag into my SR556 before I entered the ground floor doors of the Statehouse with a pair of ODSTs. One of them threw in a grenade through the glass free frame of the door into the space beyond. We waited until the flash of the explosion before rushing in.

We charged in with the Master Chief just ripping the door from its frame. Then all of us, eighty-four members of Bravo 3/137th Infantry, twelve members of the 34th ODST Battalion, and the Master Chief stacked up and rushed into the hallway beyond. Inside the statehouse we heard the echoes of rifle fire on all levels. The fighting for us ranged from shooting the enemy to some of my troops and the Colonial Marine Corps hacking at each other with combat knives. Machetes, Kukris, axes, hatchets, and entrenching tools or anything they lay their hands on from broken chair or table legs to stanchions. It was a mad melee of blood, sweat, and guts. I found myself firing at knife fight range into one Colonial Marine as I also drove my left foot into the midsection of another.

_**The UNSC Infinity 21 October 2557 CE**_

Lieutenant Commander Thomas Lasky stood at the holographic tactical display. He was watching as one Colonial ship after another either succeeded in hitting his with one of their coil gun rounds or a missile that got lucky and passed through the CIWS and secondary battery fire. The Infinity shuddered with the impacts of the kinetic energy rounds, or with the firing of the MAC cannons. Each time the MAC fired a Battlestar died.

Lansky's eyes also wondered over the incoming reports from the ground operation in Topeka, Kansas the 3/ 367th Marine Expeditionary Unit had taken and cleared the Topeka – Shawnee County Law Enforcement Center, the buildings housing the Federal Courthouse and Downtown Post Office, the Town Center, the Bank of America Building and the Shawnee County Courthouse. The 3/ 367th MEU were still fighting their way into the building housing the offices of the Topeka City Government, Topeka Performing Arts Center, and Municipal Court House. The 34th ODST and Spartans along with the troops of the 3/ 137th Infantry Combined Arms were fighting their way into the Kansas State House. The 3/ 137th according to historical records was part of the 137th Heavy Brigade Combat Team of the 35th Infantry Division.

"Erwin, what is your estimate on the end of fighting in Topeka, Kansas?" Lansky asked the Infinity's AI. As he waited for the AI to evaluate the situation on Earth an Ensign handed him a report from the Sensor Division. It read that: _Three slip space windows of an unusual type opened up three kilometers out from our position. From them a trio of small ships firing plasma beams, railguns, and missiles at the Colonial ships. Visual observation shows that the ships are part of the United States Air Force. The ships also launched sixteen fighter craft each and they have joined with the Longswords engaging the Colonial fighters and their gunships. _He looked up to the Holotank seeing that the three new ships were flanking his and sharing their shields with his to help keep enemy fire from doing more damage.

"The fighting on the ground in the Topeka, Kansas area will be over before the battle with the Colonials is over. I've detected three more similar slip space windows on the far side of the Colonial battle fleet. And I'm receiving a communique from the commander of one of our new friends is asking to speak with the commander of the Infinity," Erwin said while looking as if he was studying military maps of the battle below.

"Patch me through to this commander, please," Lansky ordered as he looked over sensor readings of the new ships. The form in the holotank was shaped similar to the Colonial ships, but about a third their size. Only instead of a whale shape these were a broad flat area with a communications and sensor tower, a long neck with missile launcher hatches along its dorsal surface, and the head was wedged shaped with four recessed turrets. One retractable turret was dorsal, one was ventral, and the other two were located port and starboard. The ship in the holotank was a composite of the three ships taken by sensors of the Infinity. Under the flat deck plate at the aft of the ships were two flight bays. One was port and the other was starboard. Between them were two cargo bays with hatches that opened to space. At the rear were a mixture of reaction drives and reactionless drives. Along the ventral surface were a set of bomb bay doors and landing gear doors. "These ships are designed to land," muttered Lansky as he looked over the composite image.

Erwin announced that the commander of the USS Hammond was online. Lansky nodded to the Holotank and the image of a blond woman in her late forties or early fifties appeared. She was in a two piece camouflaged uniform. On the collar of the tunic were a single black five pointed star on each tip. The woman's hair was braided and put up in a bun at the back of her head. She was sitting in a centrally located Command Chair. Behind her was her ship's version of a tactical holotank. Lansky decided to speak first, "I'm Lieutenant Commander Thomas Lansky of the United Nations Space Command Navy. I'm the senior surviving officer aboard the UNSC Infinity. We suffered a slip space failure due to an energy overload caused by a high energy pulse following the destruction of an enemy planet." He saw that the woman in the pale battleship gray colored CIC on the other ship nodding as she digested what he told her.

The woman then stood up. She looked to be about five feet ten inches tall. She smiled then she spoke, "I'm Brigadier General Samantha Carter. I'm also the commanding officer of this ship the USS George S. Hammond and Commander Second Space Wing. The ships on either side of you are the Second Space Wing of the United States Air Force's Space Forces Command. We took up your side of the battle because we were planning on hitting the Colonials any way to break the Siege of Earth. What is your mission here since you seem to have found my Earth rather than yours Commander Lansky?"

Staring at the holographic image of Brig. Gen. Carter, Lansky straightened as if he was assuming the position of attention before a superior officer. Since to him in the UNSC Armed Forces a Brigadier General out ranked him before he replied to her question he wanted to render appropriate military courtesy. "My mission General Carter is to defend Earth from alien or separatist attack. Since the Colonial forces in Earth's space come from an Alien human nation I am doing what I can to defend Earth against an alien invasion. There is a Stalingrad like battle taking place in the city of Topeka, Kansas. On my own initiative I ordered the landings of the 367th UNSC Marine Expeditionary Unite, the 34th UNSC Marine ODST Battalion, and the 23rd UNSC Navy Spartan Team into the Battle of Topeka."

"I see Commander can you brief me on the situation on the ground?" Carter asked looking at him possibly using a similar system as to his for communications. Lansky looked to Erwin for an update. As the Infinity's AI evaluated the data flowing into his database Erwin looked very much like a General Officer going over intelligence reports and action reports form his forces on the battlefield.

Erwin looked up, "The fighting in the down town area is coming to an end. There are some Colonial Marine hard liners called Razors holding the Statehouse that are slowing the recapture of the state government offices and legislature of the State of Kansas." Erwin looked like he was adjusting the controls on an old style FM field radio and then Lansky noticed that Erwin was standing in holographic form on the deck of the Hammond's Bridge giving General Carter the full report.

Lansky saw Carter nodding as she listened to Erwin's report. Then she turned her attention to Lansky just as he got a report from a Petty Officer from the Sensor Division about six new spatial anomalies appearing and fading. After the anomalies faded, sensors picked up six starfish shaped starships. Each ship launched around eight hundred fighters and took up positions blocking the Colonial ships in the battle space. "Commander Lansky the wormhole openings you just picked up are our other new friends. They are a breakaway group of a race called the Cylons. These Cylons are friendly to the people of Earth and are allies. They are the only allies able to aid Earth at this time since the Free Jaffa Nation is tied up in a war with the Lucian Alliance. We were faced with fighting the Colonies of Kobol alone until I made contact with the Free Cylon Collective several weeks ago near Mars." Lansky nodded at Gen. Carter's information.

"These Cylons then pose no threat, but instead are fighting on our side in this battle?" Lansky asked. "What are their feelings about working with AIs? I sense that since you are taking the battle reports from Erwin's projection that you're used to working with AIs."

"The Cylons are AIs Commander. Their race includes mechanical soldiers and workers called Centurions, human-clones enhanced with nanocybernetics, and even their ships are AI beings that use a cloned cyborg known as a Hybrid as the ship's computer core. The Cylon starships are in effect the main body of the Hybrid," Carter replied while taking in more information from Erwin. Lansky almost jumped with a hologram resembling one of the Roswell Grays appeared to make a report to Carter.

Lansky observed aloud, "So you utilize AIs as well I see General Carter. What are your people's stands on them?" He wanted to know for his, Erwin, and Cortana's sake just what this Earth's position the use of AIs. He wanted to know if this Earth regarded its AIs as fellow citizens rather than unfree servants and slaves. "What I want to know General Carter is these does your society use AIs as slaves and servants or are AIs treated as fellow citizens with full rights as an organic citizen?"

Carter looked back at Lansky with a look of understanding on her face. She cleared her throat and said, "Commander currently on Earth we don't have many AIs, but the few that we do have are treated as the people they are or used to be. Thor the AI for the USS Hammond is the digitalized essence of a former ally of ours, Commander Thor…" The Roswell Gray said something to Carter that looked like he was correcting her discussion of him, "Excuse me, Supreme Commander Thor was before he uploaded himself first into the original Asgard Core and then into the copy of the Core onboard the Hammond the Commander in Chief of the Asgard Fleet."

Supreme Commander Thor's holographic image turned to Erwin and nodded. Then a copy of him appeared on the bridge of the Infinity. He looked like it was nothing for him to do something like this as he looked around the larger bridge of the UNSC ship. "Greetings Lieutenant Commander Thomas Lansky, I'm or rather was Supreme Commander Thor of the Asgard Fleet. I've been an ally of the Tau'ri or the humans of Earth both as an individual and as a member of the Supreme Council of the Asgard Consulate. Like you I was a living organic being, but our race abandoned sexual reproduction many millennia ago and used cloning to continue our race. The process of this cloning deformed our bodies until we faced a genetic disease that threatened to kill us off as a species. We downloaded our very essences into a computer core we gave to the Tau'ri with all our knowledge for they, you are the Fifth Race and heirs to the Alterans or Ancients who were the first evolution of humanity in this galaxy and universe." Thor went on to give Lansky a history of this universe's Milky Way Galaxy.

Lansky nodded absorbing all that the Asgard Supreme Commander told him as he listened to the lesson on the history of this universe. He needed to ask, "In your interfacing with Erwin you must have downloaded the data on our history?" The Asgard nodded. "You've seen the files on the races of the Covenant, yes?" Again Thor nodded. "Do you have any of these races in this universe's Milky Way Galaxy?"

Thor blinked his oversized black eyes then said, "No Commander Lansky we do not. Once the worlds of these races had primitive civilizations, but the Goa'uld in their rise to power and tyranny destroyed their worlds killing all that lived on them. The ones called the Elites were in the beginnings of interstellar space flight and the Goa'uld saw them as a threat and not only bombed their culture into the Stone Age, but they also glassed their planet so that nothing would live there." Lansky nodded watching the Holotank as Thor showed him the ancient demise of the enemies and new friends of his universe. Thor looked at Lansky who looked as if he was wondering about the Goa'uld so he spoke, "Fear not about the Goa'uld. The Tau'ri and their allies have long since destroyed the Goa'uld Empire and all the System Lords are now dead. No one of the Goa'uld race except the Tok'ra still exists. All the Goa'uld hosts have been liberated from their enslavement. The Tok'ra don't enslave their hosts, but instead live a symbiotic relationship with their human companions."

To Lansky this was a totally new universe from the one he was ejected from. "Thor will you tell me about the Colonials?" Thor nodded and began to describe a project where a faction of the Alterans took humans from Earth to an earthlike world somewhere about 4000 light years straight rimward from Earth. This world was near the edge of the Orion-Cygnus Spiral Arm Fragment. There the Olympians or the Lords of Kobol as the Colonials called them fostered the growth of a branch of humanity free of the enslavement by the Goa'uld. Then something happened and there was a war. The civilization of the Lords of Kobol was destroyed with their charges going in two different directions. By the time of the destruction of their civilization there were thirteen tribes of Kobolian humans. Twelve tribes migrated to a cluster of two binary star systems with twelve habitable planets between the four star systems. "The Colonials spent the next two thousand years rebuilding their civilization. Somewhere in that time they lost space flight and regained it. The ships hear in orbit around Earth are the result of their reconstruction."

"What happened to this thirteenth tribe of Kobolians?" Lansky asked.

"They left Kobol seeking Earth, but never arrived in any of the times when the Alterans were still here or even after their return to Earth from their exile in the Pegasus Galaxy. Evidence found on Kobol by an expedition sent there using the USS Odyssey discovered that the disaster on Kobol was a war between humans and some sort of AI race. At some point the Olympians developed a way to implant the minds of the AI race into organic bodies. They even taught the AIs the process of making the organic bodies and the downloading technology. Our expedition found that the AIs found a world very similar to Earth even with the same land to water ratio and its continents in similar shape to Earths. What the Odyssey found on this new planet was a civilization that destroyed itself in the very nuclear holocaust that Earth avoided."

Lansky nodded at Thor feeling that this universe in its own way was just as dangerous as the one of his birth. "So this Thirteenth Tribe at some point in its development self-destructed?" Thor nodded affirming Lansky's thoughts. He looked at the holographic projection of the Hammond's AI realizing that this Earth like his has accepted AIs as individuals and as partners without making slaves of them.

Lansky looked at Thor then, "We were almost destroyed in a twenty year long war with the Covenant. They were egged on by psychotic priests called the Prophets, believing that Humanity was a plague upon the galaxy and that we would destroy all life within it. I am a product of that war Thor. Even if I wasn't born on Earth myself I will fight to my dying breath to defend her and her colonies from enemies foreign and domestic." Thor nodded understanding exactly for when he was an organic lifeform he too had the same passion about his race and world.

_**Earth Orbit 21 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

The Battle of Earth raged into its second day. The combined forces of the IOA nations, the Free Cylons, and the UNSC in Exile were systematically destroying the Colonial Occupation Fleet. On the ground the Battle of Topeka was becoming the focal point of the whole ground war. Helena Cain stood in the CIC of the Pegasus looking at the plots of the Colonial Retribution Fleet and ones of the enemy forces. So far the enemy fleet consisting of two Earth origin ship classes and a new force made of star shaped ships that used an FTL similar to that used by the Colonials. In fact the communications intercepts of the star shaped ships almost resembled Cylon Codes of the Cylon War.

"Just what we need the Cylons returning from the wrong direction. This was well the wrong side of the Armistice Line. Granted this was actually Colonial Space, but the Cylons were supposed to be rimward of the homeworlds of the Colonials." Cain's rant was heard throughout the CIC. The Command Crew and Marine Guards looked away from their Commander and carried out their duties. "Where the frak are Nagala and Adama?" she screamed throwing a data sheet across the table. Commander Tyron Trenton the Commander of the Pegasus and Executive Officer of Battlestar Group 62 watched as it appeared like Cain was having a breakdown, but he didn't say anything.

Likewise Colonel Jurgen Belzen just picked up the transparencies Adm. Cain tossed about from the deck of the CIC. He looked up at the Admiral and said, "According to our reports the same star shaped ships that came to the aid of the Tau'ri are engaged with the Battlestar Group 44 in the Alpha Centauri Alpha system over New Caprica. A courier Raptor brought this communique from Admiral Nagala says that BS-44 has been forces to withdraw to the Alpha Centauri Beta System. He says if they are forced from the Alpha Centauri Cluster they will have to retreat to Earth or to one of the systems rimward of Earth. The star shaped ships have destroyed all but the Atlantia, Valkyrie, and Yashuman and a hand full of Gunstars and Escorts plus a scattering of support ships and the Hospitalstar Mercy.

Cain looked up staring at Col. Belzen with an odd look on her face. "What did you say Jurgen? Are you saying that Nagala's reserve force has been decimated or worse?" Col. Belzen nodded in reply. "Damn, what the frak are Nagala and Adama thinking without the Alpha Centauri system we can't possibly hold the Earth system. It will be easy to trap us here and take out the fleet ship by ship." As she said this, Fisk handed her a report. "Damn it! The enemy has just destroyed Marinestar Group Thirty-Six and Battlestar Group 12 in mass. As it is now we are the only intact Battlestar Group in the Earth system."

At that point Junior Lieutenant Louis Hoshi looked up from the Communications Station shouting with urgency in his voice, "Admiral we're receiving a signal from the commander of the largest of the Tau'ri ships! The commanding officer claims to be a Lieutenant Commander Thomas Lansky of the United Nations Space Command Ship Infinity! He wants to discuss the terms of our surrender!"

_**Kansas Statehouse 21 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

The shooting was getting heavy as we cleared our way to the rotunda. We waited to study the Colonial positions. There were sniper and machinegun nest on the second floor. In the halls on the first floor some of the troops had barricaded themselves on the south and east ends of the Statehouse. I saw the enemy troops were steadying themselves for our final assault. To me it looked as if they were expecting to live through the next several minutes.

Helo aka Junior Lieutenant Karl Agathon wasn't a Marine, well not a Marine Rifleman. No he was a Marine Aviator whose Raptor was now a pile of scrap metal back down on the parking lot north of the Water Tower. Yesterday one of the first shells from the Americans attack hit his Raptor directly. The artillery round pierced the hull and exploded. The explosion ruptured the tylium tank and the Raptor was nothing but tin foil afterwards. Agathon never had a chance to fly it out of Topeka to a safe location to the south and east near a city in a province called Arkansas. The city's name if he remembered right was Little Rock.

No instead Helo found out just how seriously the Marines considered that each Marine's secondary MOS was that of Rifleman. He now commanded an ad hoc platoon of mechanics, clerks, Fleet crewmen, and other not combat Marines holding a barricade on the ground floor of the rotunda of the Kansas Statehouse. Helo peered over the debris he and his Marines and Fleet troops had stacked to provide cover for their defensive position. In the gloomy darkness of the early morning the shadows cast by the fires burning here and there in the building caused by flash bang and fragmentation grenades made one think they were seeing movement everywhere.

I looked over the barricade on our floor and gauged the distance to the nearest of the machinegun nest above us on the balcony that overlooked the rotunda's central floor. "We need to clear out those machinegun nests on the balcony. I'm damn sure the Colonials also have snipers hidden up there too. What do you think Chief? We clear them and take the barricades at the same time?"

Two squads of Marines were behind the Colonial barricades at Helo's position He finished his visual recon of the other side of the rotunda. Nothing, yet he was sure that the Americans and their new allies would soon finish off the last of the defenders of the Statehouse. Helo checked his assault carbine. He had changed out the magazine for a fresh one and still had six more in reserve. He was out of any fragmentation grenades and only had one smoke. His pistol had a full magazine and two in reserve, but now anti-armor rounds for its underbarrel grenade launcher. All of the anti-armor rounds originally developed for fighting Cylons in the Cylon War had been used up fighting the soldiers in the combat armor. Now all they had left were a few anti-tank rockets for the Colonial Mk IV RPGs. His platoon had only two RPGs and four rounds apiece for them.

Over my HHR I called my platoon leaders, "Ok when I give the signal toss flash bangs first then frags. Don't assault their positions until your M203s have fired their grenades and they've gone off. I don't want our people charging into their own grenades! George do you have the grenade spigot equipped on your Garand and do you have any frag rifle grenades left?"

I got a click back from him, "Good now I what you to take out the MG nest on the left." Another click told me he understood. For a man in his upper eighties according to the calendar he was as healthy as a man half his age. I had to hand it to George he sat out all the wars between Vietnam and now, but he served his country in World War Two, Korea, and Vietnam.

All I know is that one night I passed George and Alice in a moment of romantic passion and I swear that their eyes glowed and their voices were deeper than normal. I wanted to know just why they were talking that way to each other, but I let it go then. Since then they've been indispensable to our operations. Alice kept my troops alive. George saw to it that they knew what they were doing. George was my Operations and Training NCO and Alice was my chief medic. Now their talents combined with the skills of all our people saw that we stayed pretty much the same eighty-four souls that survived the opening weeks of the War.

I don't know where George got the rifle grenades, but he had enough for me too. I took the M203 on my SR556 and fired it. Then I dropped the carbine to dangle on its bungee sling and I took up my Yugo SKS with one of George's HE grenades and shifted to the next MG nest and fired the SKS. Both grenades impacted within seconds of each other exploding inside the piled up furniture used to provide cover for the two MG nests. At that signal the displaced Spartan next to me led the charge against the barricade.

I took up my carbine again and as fast as I could squeeze its trigger I shot whoever wore Colonial Black that appeared in my sight picture. The sounds of grenades going off punctuated our attack. The Colonials were firing back and some of my lighter armored troops fell to their defensive fires, but we charged on. I jumped more than climbed over the barricade and emptied my SKS after doing the same with my SR556. I changed mags on the carbine and fed another stripper clip into the SKS. I was so in the rhythm of the firefight that I never knew when I drew one of my pistols, but I was sending .45 ACP rounds into some of the Colonials who tried to resist me.

I was soon face to face with a young Colonial Officer with the Colonial Marine Corps Aviators Badge on his uniform. He had the pips or rank pins of a Junior Lieutenant and I had him dead to rights. He was looking up the muzzle of my .45 his eyes as wide as Susan Bs. "Hands up! Now tell your troops to surrender!" I ordered as I looked into his eyes. His pupils were the size of pennies.

Helo looked into the muzzle of the large bore pistol in his face. A woman that looked like his now dead ECO was holding it on him. In accented Caprican she ordered him to surrender and to surrender his troops. Helo knew he was dead if he failed to comply and he wanted to go home to Caprica so dearly. This invasion of Earth was so ill conceived and the planning never took in the resistance the populace planet wide would offer up. Besides he hurt from several fragment cuts. There was a bullet nick along his right biceps causing him to favor that shoulder. Their medic was either killed or captured earlier so there wasn't anyone to treat the wounds.

Not only that, but the entire garrison of the Statehouse hadn't had rations since two days ago. His stomach was complaining about the absence of food. Gods damn it he had to think of the wellbeing of his troops. He saw that on the tab on the front of the soldier's shirt was a pair of black connected bars. This woman was an American officer, a Captain to be exact. He raised his hands after dropping his weapons to the floor.

"I'm Junior Lieutenant Karl Agathon, Colonial Marine Corps Aviation. I guess I'm the senior surviving officer present. Captain I offer you my and my men's surrender. We need medical care and food, most of all food and water. The last rations to reach us was two days ago. Then the shelling started." Helo looked around of the sixty Marines and Fleet personnel defending his post only twenty of them were still standing.

One of the Colonial Marine knuckle draggers looked up at Helo from where he sat on the floor nursing a large bloody gash on the anterior part of his thigh. "Helo, what the frak are you doing Lieutenant?" Marine Crew Sergeant Aaron Dandridge asked looking Helo in the eyes. Crew Sergeant Dandridge looked from Helo to the Tau'ri Captain holding a pistol on Helo. He blinked once, twice and thought to himself, "What the hell is a Six doing in command of a company of Tau'ri soldiers?" Helo had noticed from the corner of his eyes Crew Sgt. Dandridge's look of recognition of the woman in front of him.

Helo wondered just how the hell a Colonial Marine could recognize a Tau'ri soldier, but instead of asking that question he just stated, "I'm saving our lives. We can go home and defend the Colonies from a possible Cylon attack if we're lying in a grave on Earth now can we?" The glare that Helo gave Crew Sgt. Dandridge shut the Marine up.

I looked at Helo as the other Marine called him, must be his callsign I guessed, then said, "Smart move Helo. Now Lieutenant, have your men and women hand their weapons to my men or the UNSC Marines with us." Helo told his men to give my troops their weapons. As I walked Helo into the open area of the floor of the rotunda Deidre came up to me to report that the north wing of the Statehouse was cleared by her, Third Platoon and a platoon of Marines from the UNSC. A shot rang out and Deidre's eyes went blank as a strange expression of surprise crossed her face. A trickle of blood flowed down her face over the bridge of her nose and down her left cheek like a red tear. Just above her nose between her brows was a hole the size of a number two pencil in diameter.

All I knew next was that I was falling to the floor with her as I tried to catch her. I hugged her and found myself on the floor with her head lying in my lap. I had removed her ballistic helmet. Pieces of skull, scalp, and gray matter covered the rear inside of the helmet. I felt a hole the size of a baseball at the rear of her skull. I felt a dam burst within me the size of Lake Mead on the Colorado River. Her life's blood wet my trousers with a warm red bath. I was isolated from the world. All that existed for me then and there was my dear dead wife and me. I didn't even hear my troops and the UNSC troops working with us spray the location of the sniper with all their weapons.

SSG Peter Wiles walked up to us afterwards. He wore his reproduction German SS dot patterned Zeltbahn or shelter quarter as a poncho over a mixture of ATACS ACUs and SS dot pattern camouflaged uniforms. He took off his German M1940 steel helmet. Then in a clear tenor voice he began to sing, ""Ich hatt' einen Kameraden einen bessern findst du nicht. Die Trommel schlug zum Streite, er ging an meiner Seite in gleichem Schritt und Tritt…" He was singing the German dirge sung at the death of a comrade. "Eine Kugel kam geflogen, gilt sie mir, oder gilt sie dir, sie hat ihn weggerissen, er liegt zu meinen Fssen, als wars ein Stck von mir…" As I sat there with Deidre's blood soaking my A-TACs I let the tears roll down my cheeks and SGT Payne continued, "Will mir die Hand noch reichen, dieweil ich eben lad'. Kann dir die Hand nicht geben, bleib du im ew'gen Leben mein guter Kamerad… mein guter Kamerad…" By the time he began the second verse the rest of our company picked up the tune and sang along either in English or German. I sang too my tears watering the hair of my fallen lover and angel. I felt a hand on my shoulder then. It was Alice Waters, George's wife. She over the last month became our company's primary medic. "Maria, dear, Deidre has gone to God. Here let the men take her to be buried. We're all here for you my child." I looked up at Alice. Yes for many of us she became a surrogate grandmother or mother. I let two medics take and roll Sarah into a poncho. Alice helped me up. My uniform was coated and soaked with Deidre's blood. It stained my hands, my face, and my clothes.

I don't remember being led from the State House, but I found myself in my Battalion's Aid Station with one of Alice's medics working on me. It seems that not all the blood on me was Sarah's some of it was mine. I took a hit from one of those heavy Colonial pistols to my left shoulder. The last thing I remembered after being taken to the Aid Station was a medic giving me a shot, and then the world turned black.

_**Ship's Hospital UNSC Infinity 25 October 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

LCDR Lansky looked over the Earth officer Master Chief Petty Officer John 117 had brought up with him when the Spartans and ODSTs were brought back up to the Infinity. She was beautiful woman with dusty ash toned auburn hair. Erwin had told him that she was a cyberneticly enhanced human. He read the medical readouts on the monitor over her. She had taken a .50 Colonial Heavy Pistol round that nearly killed her after a sniper's bullet had taken the soldier and organic AI woman that was her wife according to the Master Chief.

Lieutenant Marianne Peters, MD came up to Lansky as he looked down at the American officer. "She's doing as well as can be expected Commander Lansky. Her nanites are repairing her internal injuries as we speak. She is possibly as strong as the newer Spartans and maybe could give the Master Chief a hard time."

"Captain Maria Harkness here from all tests is a clone of several of the Model Sixes we've met within the Free Cylon Fleet and as POWs amongst the ranks of the Colonial Forces captured here on Earth," LT Peters said as she used an UNSC Naval issue medical scanner to check CPT Harkness' vitals and the progress of the woman's healing. An injury that should have killed her or even left her in a coma was healing nicely.

Lansky looked at the woman lying in the Intensive Care Facility's bed. She was a new lifeform. Her people had infiltrated her onto Earth to learn about Earth culture. Not as a prelude to an invasion, but so that the humanoid Cylons could eventually join the cousins of their creators as one without the Earthers or as they were called in this universe the Tau'ri knowing. Jacob Cavil and the rest of the Collective's Senior Council decided that it was best to become one with the Tau'ri without open interaction as this would have caused panic amongst the civilian populations of Earth.

"Erwin do you think that Captain Harkness and her fellow Cylon infiltrators on Earth would make good recruits to fill the ranks of the 34th Marine ODST Battalion?" Lansky asked of the Infinity's AI. From the hologram emitters in the Sickbay the AI appeared and looked as if he too was examining the readouts of the life signs monitor over the head of her bed.

"Commander Lansky this woman and the others like her we've found amongst the ranks of the American Armed Forces would all make decent ODSTs or even Spartans," Erwin said as he cataloged the data the Infinity's internal sensors fed him on CPT Harkness' condition.

Master Chief John 117 came into the ICF of the Infinity's Ship's Hospital. There in the automedic bed CPT Harkness was resting in a medically induced coma. The automedic was aiding with her healing, but it seemed that the nanite colony within her would have had her back into combat readiness within a few days longer than the automedic. He had already done his own analysis of CPT Harkness during the Battle of The Statehouse. She had taken lead of all the UNSC and American military forces involved in the clearing of the Kansas Statehouse.

Captain Maria Harkness of the Kansas Army National Guard as far as Master Chief Petty Officer indeed possessed the qualities to become an ODST and perhaps the next generation of Spartan. "Commander Lansky I would like to have Captain Harkness volunteer first for ODST training and then be selected for Spartan enhancements and training," John said looking at the Ship's Commander through the gold faceplate of his helmet.

I moaned as I heard the last of what Master Chief was telling the naval officer in the black duty uniform. Lieutenant Commander Lansky they called him. I remembered the Doctor and the Master Chief referring to him by rank and name. Light was seeping into my darkness as I began to regain consciousness. For the last several days as I guess my body repaired itself I was actually spending time as far as my mind knew on my fishing and hunting retreat on the shores of Lake Perry.

A brightly colored Alteran woman met me there to tell me that all of the Cylon humans on Earth had been awaken. She told me her name was Oma Desala. She looked at me while she sat on one of the two benches around our outdoor fireplace. With a calmness that was infectious I listened to her as she spoke of the Alterans and Daniel, my younger brother's time with them. Then she said, "We have been neglecting our children and theirs for far too long. We thought that you all would develop peacefully and become one with us in the fullness of time. But other factors we had not foreseen came into play. The civil war on Kobol, the diaspora of the Kobolian humans and your ancestors the Kobolian Cylons, the Goa'uld conquest of much of the core of the Galaxy, the plague that killed billions of Alterans, endless wars and disasters on Earth, an finally the Cylon War and what led up to it in the Colonies all slowed your people's progress. You and the pure strain humans are our children Maria. Don't worry about Deidre; she'll be here to meet you when the time's right."

Oma faded away as did my vision of peace as the light from outside my eyelids seeped in spreading as my senses returned to me. "ugh… ungh… what hit me?" I croaked as I came to in a bed in a hospital. There were a man and a woman standing there with the Master Chief. "How… how did I get here? Where is here anyway?" I asked being slightly disoriented and feeling achy all over. I looked at the man he was dressed in a duty uniform in black. The woman was dressed similarly except she had on a white lab coat and a stethoscope draped around her neck. The man was the one who answered me, "Captain Harkness you are in the Ship's Hospital on the UNSC Infinity. I'm Lieutenant Commander Thomas Lansky the commanding officer of the Infinity. This woman is Lieutenant Marianne Peters, MD, the Infinity's Chief Medical Officer. I take it you've already met Master Chief Petty Officer John 117?" I nodded then looked over at the Master Chief, "Chief do you ever remove your helmet? I mean when I talk to you I feel as if I'm talking with Darth Vader with your face concealed by the helmet."

LCDR Lansky chuckled at my comment to the Master Chief. LT Peters just turned away to conceal her smile at my observation which I voiced. The Master Chief first reached a space somewhere on the back of the helmet with one hand and took a small device with a memory chip slot on it from a pouch fastened to his armor with the other. From behind his helmet he pulled a chip the size of a quarter and installed it into the like sized slot on the device. Then he reached up with his hands and unfastened the locks around the connection ring. There was a slight pop as the pressure equalized between the inside of his helmet and that of the room.

Then with both hands he lifted the helmet off. He lifted it slowly revealing inch by inch a face which though lined by scars still looked ruggedly handsome. I'm not exclusively Lesbian as I saw John's face I saw a man who would make someone a perfect mate. He looked to be a man with whom a woman could breed a race of warriors. He pulled his helmet off and rested on his right hip keeping it in place with his right hand.

His face could use some sun, not too much, just enough to give him some color. His skin was as pale as a Viking's. He had a face that an Ancient Greek warrior would love, handsome but crisscrossed with an intricate map of scars that were a physical testament to his military career. It was his 201 File. My body had its share of scars testifying to my tours of duty to Iraq and Afghanistan yet his eyes told me more about him than even his facial scars did. They were an unnatural shade of blue. I looked at him wanting to touch his face with a comforting touch from my fingertips, but I still was too achy to try lifting them that high.

His eyes looked at me and I felt warm within. I could see he saw my own life as a soldier in my eyes. Then the moment was interrupted by a feminine voice that held a tint of jealousy within its tone, "Just wait a minute there Chica! John's my man! I'm not letting some infiltrator human form organic AI just steal him away from me!" My eyes were draw to the direction of the small projector and a bluish transparent woman with dark hair and eyes standing there tapping her feet with her arms defiantly folded and tucked under her breasts. The expression on her face told volumes.

She was angry, in love, and jealous. She would defend her man if she were physically able. Only she was just a holographic representation of the AI that loved the Spartan. I saw this in her reaction to me. I also could feel her talking to me even though I didn't see her lips move. No all her face did was to match the glare of daggers her eyes gave me. I broke the frigid air when I directed my next comment to the hologram of the woman, "Listen little Miss Tinkerbelle, I don't have any romantic aspirations toward John. I just lost my wife of ten years and I have a hole bigger than the Grand Canyon in my heart where she was torn from me by a sniper's bullet!" Like the holographic woman my mouth didn't move when I talked to her.

How I did this I didn't know. I've never done it before. It was unusual. She looked at me and said vocally, "Stop making it seem you've never interfaced with another AI Six, or should I say Captain Maria Harkness?" The blue holographic woman was looking at me tapping her foot. "Huh, aren't you going to answer me Six. Oh and stop connecting to my head. Like you I like my privacy!"

Looking at her not thinking that I could have done such a thing, I said, "I'm sorry if I somehow connected with you, but I still am not used to this ability. I knew I was a Cylon the moment I met the infiltrators my company captured among the Colonials Armed Force during the Battle of Topeka. I just didn't know for sure what all our abilities were until it seemed I was talking to Cortana in my head."

Lansky looked at me nodding then to Dr. Peters he said, "Doctor you said Captain Harkness here and her siblings are able to receive and send subspace signals?"

Dr. Peters nodded and said, "Yes it is the way they down load their databases including base personality and memories into the clone that replaces their current body if it dies within range of a resurrection ship according to Jacob Cavil. Their creators the last five survivors of Cylon Earth showed the Colonial Cylons how to build the technology. The subspace transmission system like their built in Wi-Fi system uses organic-cybernetic technology. Captain Harkness' entire body is one massive nanite colony. Only instead of tearing her apart like destructor nanites these augment her organic tissues and she has denser bones and muscle fibers. Her eyesight is far better than ours as are her other senses. On the strength and endurance level Captain Harkness and her siblings are as strong as any Spartan III and would give a Spartan II like Master Chief here a run for his money."

Lansky nodded again the looked from me to the Master Chief then finally to Cortana. "Cortana what have you learned from being inside Captain Harkness' head?" The holographic displace of Cortana looked me over like she was studying me like her creator Dr. Catherine Halsey would have. That is one thing I learned from our file sharing experience Cortana was the digital clone and effective daughter of Dr. Halsey.

"The Model Six was meant originally to be a Liaison between humans and Cylons and to supervise details of the Centurion models. She is also a skilled pilot, martial artist, soldier, and intelligence operative. Captain Harkness in particular has excelled as a Topeka Police Department Detective Sergeant. She is also an up from the ranks soldier in the Kansas Army National Guard where she started out as a Combat Engineer then transferred into the Military Police before going to Officer Candidates' School. Normally it takes a soldier in the American Army six to eight years to reach Captain from Second Lieutenant, but Harkness did it in four." Then Cortana looked me over more and I knew she was in my head again just reading my memories directly.

"Her neural pathways are supplemented with silicon pathways. She is likely to calculate faster than even the Master Chief. Also her long-term memory is far superior to any human, but also to that of a Spartan's." After she said this Cortana sat on holographic ammo crate to look at me knowing that in fact I was actually a better AI than her.

_**CIC Colonial Battlestar Pegasus Lunar Orbit, 25 October 2013/ YR 1997**_

The clattering cacophony of the battle between the Pegasus' crew and the boarders quieted as the last resistance was overcome. Captain Annike Anckarström commanding officer D Company 34th Marine Orbital Drop Shock Troop Battalion stepped into the Combat Information Center or Bridge of the Pegasus. Her M5A2 assault rifle was aimed at Rear Admiral Helena Cain's chest. In her full ODST armor Annike looked very much like a Cylon from the Cylon War. Only it was a human female's voice that emitted from the voice emitters of the helmet. Capt. Anckarström held her rifle on the most senior looking Colonial Fleet officer present.

"I'm Captain Annike Anckarström commander of C Company 34th Marine ODST battalion and you ma'am and your Bridge Crew are my prisoners! Now drop your weapons and raise your hands!" said Capt. Anckarström as she held Adm. Cain under the sights of her gun. Anckarström saw that the woman was sweating profusely and that the woman's eyes were gauging whether she should offer one last attempt at resistance.

Rear Adm. Cain couldn't see the face of her adversary as it was blocked from view by a gold reflective surface on the person's helmet. So she could judge just how nervous the armored soldier facing her was. Looking around at the dead, wounded and dying Marines and Fleet officers and crewmen Cain realized her war was over. She let the muzzle of her pistol drop forward, but the leader of the armored soldiers just motioned with her carbine's muzzle for Cain to lay it on the plot table, "Lay it there and don't pick it up."

Cain nodded and laid her sidearm on the table and held her hands up head high. "I'm Rear Admiral Upper Half Helena Cain. I'm the Commander of the Battlestar Pegasus and Battlestar Group 62. Captain, I surrender the Officers and Crew of the Battlestar Pegasus and the ships and crews of Battlestar Group 62," Cain said looking at Capt. Anckarström. The rest of Anckarström's Command Node and the Company HQ Platoon's security forces subdued the CIC crew and used quick cuffs to secure their hands including Rear Adm. Cain's.

Only then did Capt. Anckarström unfasten and take off her helmet. She let her short cropped blond hair fall around her ears. Cain blinked in surprise at seeing a female, a woman under the helmet. "This is how it's going to play out Admiral Cain. General Samantha Carter will be taking your formal surrender. So far the four scattered landing areas in the United States and the three in Canada are being reduced as we speak. Your Marines in Israel have been pushed back into the Gaza Strip and the Israeli Defense Force is just letting the Colonial Marines get a taste of urban combat against Hamas' militia. The Russians and Chinese have paid your people back for the nuclear bombardment by using their strategic nuclear weapons against your landing zones on their soil."

Capt. Anckarström looked down at the Pegasus' tactical plot table then back up at the Admiral she just captured, "As for your troops in Australia the Royal Australian Army has them trapped in two different locations. One force is trapped in the center of the Australian Outback in the southern third of Australia's Northern Territory. The other group well they've been cornered in this peninsula of the Australian state of Queensland. It seems the Australians have decided that they're going to let the desert of the Outback kill part of them and the swamps and crocodiles of Queensland's north coast take care of the rest."

**Chapter Four**

**The Cylons Were Created By Man…**

**They Rebelled…**

**They Evolved…**

**There Are Many Copies…**

**And They Have a Plan…**

_We shall meet, but we shall miss him, There will be one vacant chair, We shall linger to caress him, When we breathe our ev'ning pray'r. When a year a-go we gather'd, Joy was in his mild blue eye, But a gold-en cord is severed, and our hopes in ru-in lie. (verse 1 The Vacant Chair H. S. Washburn and George F. Root)_

_**Kansas State House Topeka, Kansas 30 November 2013 CE/ YR 1997**_

I was in my Dress Blues with the rest of my Company who survived the Battle of the Kansas Statehouse. We were attending a memorial to the men and women we lost a month and nine days ago. The ODSTs and Spartans that took part were there as well in their dress uniforms. The President and Governor were present and the TAG (The Adjutant General) of Kansas was presenting medals to the soldiers of B Company 3/ 137th as well as members of the 35th and 137th Military Police Companies and the Airmen of the 190th Security Squadron of the 190th Air Refueling Wing. I noticed as I listened to the speeches of the dignitaries that not all the damage from the battle had been repaired.

Next to me were First Sergeant George Waters and Major Alice Waters. I had been promoted to Major as well and had orders to report to Fort Riley after this ceremony. They orders said that I was slated to go through ODST evaluation and sorting. It seems that I've been volunteered by someone with a higher pay grade to see if I had what it takes to be a Helljumper. As I stood there thinking this over the President, Governor and Tag began to resent the awards and decorations earned by the soldiers that took part in the Battle of Topeka and the myriad of battles and smaller engagements that made it up.

The Command Sergeant Major of the Kansas Army National Guard stood to one side and began to read the orders and citations of each soldier's medal. After several names were called and their citations read as the Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces John Patrick Ryan pinned on the appropriate award to the specific solder or airman's left breast pocket. They finally came to me and B Company. I had barely a prewar platoon left, but we had survived a month in Hell fighting to defend our city. For the United States of America Topeka was our Stalingrad. I was laid up in an orbital field hospital for most of the rest of the War, but I was released for duty just before being shuttled back down to Earth for this ceremony. The CSM read my citation and then before the President's party left me for the next recipient he read of Deidre's. The President who had been to the opening of the Topeka National Cemetery also had handed me the flag that draped Deidre's coffin on the only other day I was allowed to come down from the Infinity the day Deidre was laid to rest. Now he was giving me the jewel boxes with the medals she has won during the Battle of Topeka.

For me he pinned on the Distinguished Service Star, the Silver Star, and two Bronze Stars. Each award was for separate actions during the Battle of Topeka. The ceremony ended after another hour of speeches and a reception was held after. I found myself standing with the ODSTs and Spartans who fought alongside me in the halls and chambers of this very building.

We stood there as others, not veterans of this battle socialized, but it was UNSC Marine Staff Sergeant Rico Gutierrez who posed the question asking, "So Major are you going to join the new Helljumper Battalion?" He smiled as he asked it knowing full well that the 34th UNSC Marine ODST Battalion had been posted to Fort Riley, Kansas to begin operation of the new Orbital Drop Shock Trooper School. The School was open to anyone in Earths new United Nations Space Command, the armed forces and exploration arm of the new United Earth Government. Across the Earth all armed forces of the member nations of the United Earth Government which took over for the old United Nations had been merged on paper at least into the new reconstituted UNSC.

From the speeches here in Topeka to those at similar events in each of the UE member nations the subject was the same. We were to rebuild Earth, build the UNSC Navy, Army, Marine Corps and the Close Orbit and Aerospace Force before giving the favor of the Colonial Invasion back to them. We were technically still at war with the United Colonies of Kobol though we had taking the surrenders of all but the small remnant force that evacuated the Alpha Centauri System on the eve of Admiral Cain's surrender of all Colonial forces in the Sol System and on Earth. Part of the buildup was to build new special operations units based on those of the UNSC. The Earth of our universe was being transformed into the Earth of Infinity's birth universe for the protection of all humans especially the humans of Earth. We were also in the process of building the interstellar government to whom the UNSC would eventually report to. This would be the Terran Confederation. This would include the worlds the Cylons rescued from the Goa'uld and protected from the Ori, Earth's colonies, Tau Ceti, and Alpha Centauri systems, and those worlds of the I.O.A. Nations. The I.O.A. merged into the UEG and also the TC also. Earth after one ill-fated campaign launched not by alien, but by descendants of humans taken from Earth by our progenitors the Alterans to save a Free Humanity to rise up and battle the Goa'uld rose to replace the Alterans. Little did they know that the rebellion on Earth against Ra and his compatriots had succeeded in toppling the megalomaniac driving the Goa'uld from our homeworld?

_**Orbital Drop Shock Troops School, Camp Funston, Fort Riley, KS 1 December 2013 CE though 31 March 2014 CE**_

I awoke seeing the rafters of an open bay barracks. It was the third full day of training and testing to see if we had the metal to successfully pass ODST or Helljumper School. Twelve Weeks of Hell were to follow after Death Week. ODST School rolled Airborne School, Ranger School, Sniper School, SERE school, and Air Assault School into one school and added learning how to fall from a perfectly good starship in a pod from orbit into Hell on another planet. You basically became a human bomb to explode out a Special Operations soldier who would make even the British SAS quake in their boots. Not that anyone would in a sane world wanted to make an SAS special operator shake in his boots and or crap his pants.

Week one passed with me still being in formation coming the following Monday. It seemed that I had what it took to go through ODST School. The weeks became a blur of learning to safely parachute out of perfectly good airplanes, jump or fast rope out of a helicopter or even LCU306 Pelican or SC305 Peregrine, survive, escape, resist, and evade being taken a POW, assaulting heavily defended objectives with only your body armor and weapons to protect you, and finally crashing through the atmosphere at hypersonic speed only make an impact on the planet just so you can come out fighting. Now the SC305 Peregrine was the new UH60 Blackhawk sized utility shuttle back engineered from the Colonial Raptors. The LCU306 on the other hand was developed from the UNSC Pelicans and was the all around landing craft of the Reconstituted UNSC.

By the last week I was ready for some Rest and Recuperation. We went into Ogden to a bar that started out in the 1890s serving members of the United States Cavalry regiments stationed at Fort Riley to eventually serving the members of the First Infantry Division, the First Armored Division and elements of the Thirty-Fifth Infantry Division. The 35th had its 320th HBCT stationed on Fort Riley while its HHC was stationed at Fort Leavenworth. Now the bar was playing host to the cadre of the ODST School and the members of the First ODST Brigade.

In the corner instead of more modern songs there were selections from albums popular during the Second World War playing. I found myself dancing with a Major Lydia Stewart one of the original ODSTs from the Infinity. The song we were listening to was Vera Lynn's "When the Lights Go on Again." This song was on the Hit Parade or top Forty of its day.

"_When the lights go on again all over the world… And the boys are home again all over the world… And rain or snow is all that may fall from the skies above… A kiss won't mean 'goodbye' but 'hello to love… When the lights go on again all over the world… And the ships will sail again all over the world… Then we'll have time for things like wedding rings and free hearts will sing… When the lights go on again all over the world…"_

I found myself crying again silently for I knew many who died this past October for whom the lights would never be on again. _"When the lights go on again all over the world… And the ships will sail again all over the world… Then we'll have time for things like wedding rings and free hearts will sing… When the lights go on again all over the world…"_ My tears made Lydia hug me closer for like me she'd lost friends and comrades in arms during battle. Soldiers whether they're Marines or Army jump into hell feet first to battle the enemies of our freedom not expecting a medal, just gratification that the people they serve, not the politicians, but the citizens of their community, nation and world give the respect their due when trouble comes and they're needed to keep evil away.

Vera Lynn's song was followed by Glenn Miller's instrumental _In the Mood_. Now don't let anyone tell you the songs popular in the 1940s didn't have any beat or speed to them. This song was ripping the air in the ward I was in. After In the Mood finished there was Frank Sinatra singing Harry Warren and Al Dubin's I Only Have Eyes for You. Sometime during that song the Oxycodone or whatever they gave me must have taken affect, because when I woke again the disk playing then was someone's copy of Crystal Visions: the very best of Stevie Nicks and her hit Edge of Seventeen was playing. I rolled over hearing a woman's voice singing along with Stevie next to me. Her voice was a soft feminine alto and she was singing, "Just like a white winged dove sings a song… sounds like she's singing…"

As I lay there in Lydia's arms later I remembered the dances Deidre and I would go to before and after Don't Ask – Don't Tell was repealed. We'd go down to the local USO to unwind when we were between rotations to either Iraq or Afghanistan. The last time Deidre and I danced was one week before the Colonial Invasion and we were in our Dress Blues. I wore the slacks with mine and she wore her skirt. We danced until the facility closed. Later we made love under the moonlight in our back yard.

Now I rested in a new lover's arms nuzzling her neck and listening to her soft content purr. I massaged her breasts and nipples only to be rewarded by more content purring. Lydia returned my ministrations with some of her own and I know more than once I arched my back only because some intense feelings taking over my whole entire being made me super sensitive to her loving strokes. Not all the purring was hers. I purred contently just as much as she was.

I looked over at her. She looked up at me and without words we made love for hours on end crafting our own work of art and grace. Lydia was a skilled lover just as good as any I've met. We finally tired ourselves out and since we were on leave until the end of the week I don't think we left our room except to get meals. The rest of the time we well dined on other things. And we became very happy and content.

I Maria Harkness a Cylon infiltrator of Earth had become a citizen of Earth in all aspects and I truly saw myself as nothing else. I was just as human as any woman born of Eve. It didn't matter that I like my sisters were conceived in a laboratory and incubated in an artificial womb. Unlike my sisters and other siblings though I was not speed grown to a fully adult form, no I was only grown to the size of a toddler and then adopted to an Earth family from Auburn, Kansas.

A week later I found myself being flown clear across country to Camp Pendleton Joint Forces Base. Again I found myself going through training. This time it was the Master Chief and several of the Spartans from the Infinity were making the selections and taking three weeks to train us up to their standard before they made their final selections for us to become Spartans, namely Spartan IVs. I learned in the initial training to trust my natural abilities over my technology. The Spartan School had used something on the Cylons in the UNSC Armed Forces to render their nanites temporarily inert so that we had to use hour brains and natural stamina.

Spartan School was six weeks of training before we even got to see our first suit of Spartan armor. Of the four hundred sent to the school I was among the finalist now in formation in the Spartan Training Center at Camp Pendleton, California. The Spartans led us in one morning to the infirmary and there in a special ward were several medical tables. "Attention Selectees, when I call out your name stand by the table with your name on it. Once there strip down to your skivvies. When directed by a medical technician lay on the table in a comfortable manner. Selectee Harkness you will come to the table I'm besides. For those of you who were Cylon infiltrators we will be turning your nanites back on. We wanted to show you that you could live without them in order to build your confidence in your own skills and natural strengths and abilities. Now listen up and move when we call your name!" shouted a Spartan in Drill Instructor uniform.

I listened and nodded. Then my name was called and I went to the table by the Spartan DI. I stripped down to my underwear and sport bra. Then a medical technician helped me to lie on the examination table. I was gently strapped in to keep me from moving during the coming procedure. "Ok Major Harkness relax and let the process work. Your nanites will be reawakened and you will receive some additional enhancements to bring your Cylon physiology up to that of a Spartan," the technician said after securing me to the table.

I was there on the table with my arms spread out from my sides. The tech nodded at me saying, "Relax Major the process is beginning." I counted backwards from 100 silently reciting calming mantras. I heard the whirring of servo motors and felt pin pricks in my arms, legs, and at my temples. Next some sort of automatic hypodermic system injected me with various chemicals. As I lay there I felt the alterations occur. My sense of smell, vision and hearing were the first signs that something was different even from my Cylon senses. I could smell, see, and hear better than before.

The procedure lasted another thirty minutes then the Master Chief came in with a woman who resembled me, only she looked younger. In my head I saw a series of code when I looked at her and I knew that I was looking at both a new Six and at Cortana. She had brunette hair with hazel eyes. I could only wonder why Cortana chose our form to become human. Yet there she was with a variation of my face. She wore the uniform of an UNSC Navy Lieutenant. Then she came over to me. "Spartan Maria it is nice to see that you're progressing better than we expected. Once the procedure is complete we'll help you to the Quartermaster to get measured for your armor and to get your basic Spartan issue."

I nodded after the needles of the auto injector machine retracted. Cortana was looking down at me and smiled, "Welcome to the world of the Spartans blue eyes." Blue eyes, mine were just as hazel as hers or at least they were. I looked up at her strangely at her comment concerning the color of my eyes. She looked back at me and then held out a pocket mirror.

My eyes indeed were now blue. I guess this was a physical sign that something had changed within me. Cortana and the MedTech unstrapped me. Next the training platoon I led was led down the corridor to be issued our new uniforms. After receive our new issue we went from the Quartermaster's to a large class room with a stage. On the stage was a UNSC Navy Rear Admiral Lower Half. She was beautiful and looked to be a determined and accomplished woman.

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Spartan Program. I'm Rear Admiral Lower Half Samantha Carter formerly a Brigadier General in the United States Air Force. I am the Commander of UNSC Space Forces Command. We are for this Earth a new and fledgling force. You as Spartans are the extreme pointy end of the spear. As such you will be walking in the footsteps of those that came before you as Spartans and as warriors of Earth on the galactic scale. As of this day forward you will be the knife edge of Earth's diplomacy and military responses to those wishing Earth and her colonies harm. Behind you are the Navy, Marines, Army and COAF of the United Nations Space Command and the weight of the United Earth Government."

"So Spartans rise up for your assignments," Rear Adm. LH Carter said then UNSC Navy personnel handed each of us a packet. "Now that you all have your packets remember we're still at war with the United Colonies of Kobol. You as Spartans are going to be the tip of the spear we'll thrust into the heart of the Colonial War Machine. Within your packet are your orders. These orders will tell you which UNSC ship you'll be assigned to. Currently those assignments will be either to a Daedalus-Class Deep Space Carrier or a Nemesis-Class Basestar. As the fleet grows and the newer designs come online you could find yourselves assigned to Halcyon-Class Frigates, Enterprise-Class Carriers, or Juneau-Class Cruisers or you could step through the Stargate to worlds connected to the Gate Network. The Spartans are going to be our main special operation troops to deal with situations that require the use of your specialized skills and abilities. Gentlemen and Ladies from this day forward you are the sword and shield of the Earth and her people."

With that the ceremony ended. We were then marched out to go to out-processing and reassignment to our new units. I thought that my assignment would be that of a reserve forces Spartan unit, but while in the out-processing line I looked within my packet. I saw that I was being assigned command of Spartan Team Twelve. Spartan Team Twelve was the Spartan Team assigned to the USS George S. Hammond. I was going to space!

_**USS George S. Hammond orbit nuclear devastated planet 4000 ly from Earth 1 April 2014**_

Rear Admiral Lower Half Samantha Carter sat in the command chair of the Hammond like she had for the last five years. The Hammond was her flagship and Deep Space Carrier Task Force Two was scouting out ahead of the UNSC main fleet. Carter looked out upon the Earthlike world below. It was recovering from a massive nuclear war thousands of years ago yet the planet couldn't support animal life as radiation levels were still too high. "Marks leave a warning buoy to warn the rest of the Fleet from landing here. Then plot a course to the next world."

"Aye ma'am," Commander Marks answered as he plotted course after launching the buoy. The hyperspace window formed light minutes from the ship. Then the ship and her escort the Apollo jumped into the hyperspace tunnel heading for a planet discovered by a Tel'Tak over a month ago. The planet was under ice age conditions surrounded by a small nebula that engulfed its star system. The scientists who were Star Wars fans were calling it Hoth after the planet in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.

"You know Admiral this next planet is misnamed," said Lieutenant Commander Jenifer Hailey sat at her station reading the data from the scanners after they left the exit hyperspace window. "I mean this planet isn't an Ice Ball world like Hoth was. It's more like Earth during one of its major Ice Ages. Here look," and LCDR Hailey projected the planet using the HUT-D. The sensors were able to penetrate the radiation and dusts of the small nebula revealing chilly Earthlike planet. The world was ice covered for most of its northern and southern hemispheres only the areas between the thirtieth parallel north and the thirtieth parallel south remained free of ice. The area around its equator was more like England and the area at the edges was more like Alaska or Siberia. Carter leaned forward a bit then turned to LCDR Sharon Satterfield, her Cylon and Communications Officer.

"Sharon, get me a subspace channel to UNSC headquarters," Carter said as she returned her attention to the planet that for lack of a better name her crew labeled Hoth. "Also call Major Harkness to the bridge. I want a surface recon of Hoth," Carter said this while observing the planet from her command chair. "Marks, take us in at half military thrust, please."

_**Bridge of the USS Hammond in orbit over Hoth**_

I came in to the bridge as we took up a stationary orbit over an icy looking planet. I saw the read outs showing in the heads up tactical display. From them I could see that this planet was habitable, well as habitable as northern Alaska or northern Canada. The planet had a green belt straddling its equator. This area looked as if it could be a viable area for colonization. Unlike the planet they had just left this world had safe background radiation levels.

I took the scout team down to the surface of the last planet. We scouted the ruins of a New York sized city. While surveying the area we found the remains of this planet's versions of Centurions mixed with the bones of what at first we thought were humans. When we scanned the bones though, we found out that they were the remains of organic Cylons. There were millions of unburied remains scattered about the ruins of the city. Most of them had signs of extreme heat exposure.

We had found the homeworld of an ancient race of Cylons at the other planet. Here we found not a garden world, but a planet that could be colonized as a garrison world in preparation for an attack on the Colonies. Of course with the ships like we used we could attack the Colonies at any time we choose, but the UNSC decided not to directly attack the Colonies from Earth. The 5000 light years that separate Earth from the Colonies maybe a challenge to the Colonial Fleet, but to the newly reconstituted UNSC using our slipstream and hyperspace drives we could reach the Colonies in a matter of hours. We just wanted to make sure we struck from a safe distance from Earth.

Carter looked up at me. I didn't wear my armor unless we were being sent into action so I was wearing my duty uniform which for the Spartans of the Reconstituted UNSC Special Operations Command was ACUs in the ATACs gray pattern. "Major Harkness I thought you would have put on your armor and wear it like many of your subordinates do," Carter said smiling at me wearing the gray ATACs ACUs.

I smiled and said, "Admiral unless we're engaged in combat operations I always have preferred wearing just my duty uniform. Since in the UNSC the Spartans were drawn from all branches we kept our ranks. My senior NCO was one of the original Spartans, Senior Chief Petty Officer Kelly 087. Kelly was a survivor. She had been with the Master Chief at the evacuation of the planet which was home to the Corbulo Academy of Military Sciences and on many campaigns after as part of Master Chief Petty Officer John 117's Spartan Team.

Of the thirty-seven Halo universes we discovered since the defeat of the Colonial Retribution Fleet only Kelly's home universe knew of her survival. It was decided that since Task Force Infinity was assisting with the creation of our own United Earth Government and United Nations Space Command that it would remain in our universe. The two UEGs formed the Trans-Universe Alliance to protect humanity in both realities. We also discovered another alternate reality where Earth was in a war with an entity called the Vilani Empire. As a result of the technology exchanges the three Earths of the TUA were becoming the major military powers of their respective realities. Also as a result as part of our task force we had two Indomitable-Class Battle Cruisers based on the Terran Confederation Navy's design though heavily modified with UNSC, an our technologies. We kept the Meson Cannon spinal mount added two heavy MAC gun spinal mounts, doubled the volume of the ship, and doubled the fighter compliment from ten to twenty using FA302F aerospace fighters.

Like the Infinity these ships were equipped with slip space drives replacing their jump drives. The Resolute and Resolve were the Indomitable-Class ships assigned to the Second Deep Space Carrier Group. While the Hammond and the Resolute took positions so that the Hammond could do an orbital survey the Apollo and Resolve went on to survey the rest of the system. We thought that with the four ships we could scout the way back to the Colonies and find any bases the Colonials may have between Earth and the Twelve Worlds.

I took Spartan Team 36 down to the surface of Hoth to recon one of the most likely positions for the placement of a base. Down on the planet we took several hours to survey a location at a river delta that emptied into the western ocean of the planet. This delta had ruins of a base on one of the rocky islands. The terrain resembled the shores of Oregon or Washington south of Puget Sound. There were mountains nearly as high as the Cascades to the north and west, the rest of the terrain outside the flood plain was escarpment and hills.

"Major ma'am we've checked the area out to one hundred meters on foot and out to ten kilometers with RPVs," CPO Kelly 087 said as she handed me a field tablet computer. I read the data being returned by the RPVs on a ridgeline about five kilometers from our base camp sat the ruins of an old city or base.

"Kelly, order the teams to converge on this location," I said sharing the location of the ruins with the Team Network. I then signaled for the Command Team to follow me in the direction of the ruins. We took another half hour to find the ruins despite the use of the RPV eyes in the sky. These were the four rotor semi-autonomous variety that could be armed with RPK47s or RPK74s or any other light machinegun along with a recon sensor package.

We rendezvoused on the site of the ruins and I left our four RPVs as overhead security. We began to in pairs recon the complex covered by the ruins. Some of the structures were similar to the pyramids of Mesoamerica. Most of the ruins were cut stone, but as we looked into them deeper we found evidence that the primitive construction was a façade. "What do you make of this Kelly?" I asked as we scouted into the interior of one of the buildings.

Kelly looked around then speculated, "It looks to be Forerunner or perhaps their alter egos the Alterans in origin Major. I wouldn't be surprised to find evidence that they were behind the Colonials. As I understand it according to UNSC Archeologist Daniel Jackson the Alterans known as the Olympians possibly transported tribes of just about every ethnic group of Earth to this Kobol, but he suspected also that they had support bases nearby or along their route from Earth where they didn't establish stargates. Jackson was telling us that the Alterans did this so that there would be a free society of humans if they weren't able to dislodge Ra and the System Lords from Earth in the time before the Kingdoms of Egypt.

"Yes from interrogations ONI conducted of Colonial POWs on Charlie Base information comes to us confirming at least that could be a possibility Kelly. It looks that the Olympians even returned to Earth for a time. Perhaps they were tracking down the Thirteenth Tribe." I looked up at my HUD seeing that this corridor went down deeper into the planet's surface. "Perhaps we can find a data core to mine that will aid in understanding what happened out here. Sadly from what ONI gleaned from the POWs the Colonials think they're all that exist of the human race and that the Galaxy is empty of any life except them, this Thirteenth Tribe, and their own creations the Cylons."

Kelly laughed remember the week they spent at Camp Patton on Charlie Base, a world which was a planet sized temperate, alpine and tropical rain forest. Camp Patton named for the American World War Two General was home to most of the Colonial Prisoners of War captured at the finale to the Battle of Earth. There were a few prisoners awaiting war crimes tribunals located in new maximum security prisons around the Earth in remote locations.

"Well we can expect Rear Admiral Cain isn't eking out a new life for herself on Charlie Base. I heard that she was a guest of the Maximum Security Isolation Facility at Leavenworth Military Disciplinary Barrack at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas," I said thinking back to the order to use nuclear weapons on the major cities of Earth on the opening day of the invasion. Nearly a billion or one seventh of our pre-war populations died because of the use of nuclear weapons on civilian populations. Out of the one million Colonial Marines landed on Earth two hundred thousand died under nuclear fires on the steps of Russia and in the interior of China. Cain wasn't the one that gave the nuclear strike order. It was her CO Vice Admiral Peter Corman. Sadly that man didn't live to see the end of the Battle of Earth. He and most of the Admirals and Generals of the Retribution Fleet were on the Warstar Acropolis when the Hammond gutted it with four precisely aimed plasma bolts. The Acropolis dying left Rear Admiral Upper Half Helena Cain in command of all Colonial Fleet forces in orbit of Earth and its moon Luna. This means that Cain was the fall guy or in this case fall gal for the Colonials in the matter of the atrocities committed by Colonial armed forces on or above Earth.

Kelly scanned the hieroglyphic on the walls of the corridor with her helmet cam sharing with me and the Hammond what she saw. She replied saying, "Yes but Cain as far as I'm concerned is just as guilty of Genocide as her CO was. Damned shame because Corman is the one truly guilty of the destruction of not only the cities destroyed by his nuclear attack, but the destruction of churches, masques, temples, an synagogues by various Razor Commandoes of the Colonial Marines is another of his crimes that Cain will have to answer for despite it was her that ordered a stop to the destruction of Earth's religious buildings, relics, and scriptures."

I looked around smiling at Kelly's observation then replied as I scanned the hieroglyphics on my side of the corridor, "And they think Spartans aren't all that intelligent. I suspect that a pure strain human modified into a Spartan becomes twice as strong, twice as dexterous, and has twice the endurance of a Cylon but only about the same intelligence. Now, the modifications to me put me at about three times the strength, stamina, and agility of an ordinary Cylon human and twice their intelligence. Though, for the mental prowess I think the nanites only make it possible for me to use three times as much of my brain than an ordinary human. Compared to you though I think I'm about on par."

"Major you know why Admiral Carter wants you to wear your armor when not around other Spartans?" Kelly asked as she let her face be seen behind her face plate. She was smiling when she asked that. I just looked at her knowing that she was about to say anyways. "It's because of your enhanced Cylon pheromones. Ordinary pure strained humans, male or female, just can't resist your enhanced Cylon sexuality. You are a walking seduction waiting to happen."

I so wanted to Gibbs slap her, but she was right and most likely would enjoy it too. "Sadly it seems only among our Spartans can I walk around in duty uniform or less and not have to worry about accidently enticing people to act like they're in heat when I enter a room. Damn I wish the ONI and UNSC scientists had thought that one through when they recruited my model into the Spartan Program. I mean the Eights, Twos, Fours, Fives and Threes worked out better than the Sixes for the augmentation therapy. I and a handful of sisters are the exceptions. It's also an error on the ONI's part for using the same augmentation process on us as they did on the normal humans. They didn't understand at all that well, that we were already augmented compared to ordinary humans."

We continued deeper into the facility until we found a chamber. The door opened when a light scanned me. How it knew that I was a human and not some other alien within my armor I don't know. At least this latest version of the Spartan Armor was lighter weight and less bulky than the MJOLNIR powered armor brought to our universe from the Prime Halo Universe. The new MJOLNIR armor was a cross of the old models and the Kull Warrior armor.

The additional enhancements allowed me to force open any doors that were inoperative. Judging from the fact that many of the doors we encountered many in this facility were keyed by sensors only to open to those with specific human and Alteran DNA combinations. To me it seemed also that some of the Cylon models like me had the Alteran DNA as part of their human DNA. Sixes it turned out had what the SGC and now the UNSC called the Alteran Technology Activation Gene within their DNA.

**Chapter Five**

_"O Stranger, send the news home to the people of Sparta that here we are laid to rest: the commands they gave us have been obeyed." Simonides of Ceos_

_**Alteran Ruins on Hoth 5 April 2014 CE**_

It was four days since we landed on Hoth and entered the Alteran ruins. I was standing in the room that looked like it was another form of Spartan infusion chamber. The Spartans under my command put the facility under guard. Kelly and I found the operations center as well. Within the Ops Center we found another Alteran Data Core. So there were techies running around all over the ancient Alteran base. I was doing a trooping of the line checking on my Spartans, the ODSTs, and Marines who were providing security for this operation. What started out a simple planetary survey and scouting mission turned into an archeological dig on the edge of what just may be Colonial Space.

We build a permanent camp on this planet around the Alteran military command building. Because my team of Spartans was in charge of the overall security we painted and planted a sign at the gate of our camp that said, _"O Stranger, send the news home to the people of Sparta that here we are laid to rest: the commands they gave us have been obeyed." _Simonides of Ceos. Seeing that reminded me of the movie _Go Tell The Spartans._ It was a 1978 film based on the 1967 novel by Daniel Ford called _Incident at Muc Wa._

The saying in French was on the sign over the gate into an abandoned Legion post that the Army Advisors were to turn into their training camp for ARVN (Army Vietnam) troops. It read, "_Étrangers, dites aux Spartiates que nous demeurons ici par obéissance à leurs lois. _(Stranger, tell the Spartans that we remain here in obedience to their orders.)" I had the feeling that the base we were building on this ice box of a world would change me forever. Yet to me it was a path I had to take so I could avenge my wife and drive the Colonials from my world.

We started to build this base as a staging point for our attack on the Twelve Worlds. When the main fleet got here we'll be jumping into Caprican Space. It was thought that Caprica in the hands of the UNSC would make the other Colonies sue for peace. However we didn't know that another party, relatives of mine had an idea of their own and that our war with the Colonials may have made them move up their scheduled attack on the Colonies.

By the fourth day of operations on Hoth we had a full Spartan Battalion on the rock. There were three hundred of us. We had a mixture of augmented humans and augmented Cylons. I was running Spartan PT or physical training and had a bunch of my Spartans running in just our PT uniforms and carrying our weapons and chest rigs. "Helljumper, Helljumper, where are you going…" We sang UNSC jodies as we went running over the hills and rills of the area around the base camp. I think the Marines began joining us on day two. The ODSTs did the same on day three. By day four I had over twenty out of our forces on planet doing morning PT with me. All I asked was that each trooper carried their weapon, plate-carrier/ LBE vest and hydration system with them during the period we ran our physical training.

_**Day 274 on Hoth 5 December 2014 CE/ YR 1998**_

We had been on Hoth for nine months now. My Spartan Team was doing wilderness survival on the flood plain of the River Rubicon. We named the river for the one that Caesar crossed on his way to Rome in 49 BCE. Now the plane we named for Marathon the site of the battle where the Greeks defeated Persians in 490 BCE. The Second Deep Space Carrier Group was on patrol in the outer system so I don't think they spotted the Raptor I saw on the ground come in system. The radiation emissions of the nebula that surrounds Hoth likely interfered with the sensors both of the DSC Group and in Camp Thermopylae.

I had the Spartans form up and we surrounded Raptor. We were a 100 meters from the ship when we saw that they had a survey team looking over the area around their bird. I signaled the Spartans to hold their positions and take cover and concealment. I knew then we had some human intelligence to grab. Now it would be us learning what was going on within the Colonies. When I saw that the survey team wasn't watching the perimeter I signaled our attack. We used Zat'nik'tals for this operation as we wanted live prisoners not dead bodies.

We got up and assaulted their position firing only one bolt per team member. The pilot, ECO, Marines and surveyors lay on the ground unconscious when we finally walked through them. Kelly set about securing the prisoners. I secured the data from the ECO's station and we made sure that we took the ship back to Camp Thermopylae.

Then the ONI staff there conducted the interrogations of the Raptor crew, Marines and surveyors. We learned that the Colonies had been attacked by the Cylons, not my people, but the followers of John Cavil from the sounds of the transcripts of the interrogations. I knew then that I had to ready our base for possible landings by the Colonials.

I went in to the interrogation room with the pilot of the Raptor. Her name was Margaret Edmondson with the callsign of Racetrack. Her rank within the Colonial Fleet was Lieutenant. I knew from ONI records that she was among the few thousand Prisoners of War we sent back for repatriation as a sign of good faith with the Colonials. Her ECO was a Lieutenant Hamish McCall whose callsign was Skulls. I had both of them brought into the interrogation room to give them their new orders.

"Lieutenants I'm Major Maria Harkness. I'm the commander of the Spartan Company assigned to Camp Thermopylae. Now I am also being sent with an ONI officer, two of my Spartans, and four ODSTs back with you to the Colonial Battlestar Galactica. I know you and several others know the way to Earth, the real Earth. You've been there only last year in October. We sent you home in December so you know the way back." I looked at them like I was going to rip their heads off. Now I wasn't, but I wanted them scared of me. It was Racetrack looking over me. I had on my ACUs, not my MJOLNIR VII Armor. I looked like I did prior to augmentation, but I had at least four times the strength and endurance of either pilot. "We're also taking back your lead Scientist."

"Why are you letting Baltar go back, and not Commander Adama?" Edmond asked of me.

"It's because he knows about the human replicant Cylons. You know there are twelve models, well thirteen if you count the Sevens, but I think the ones in this part of the galaxy only know of the Ones through Sixes and the Eights. I suspect also that the five that survived the death of Cylon Earth don't even know that they are Cylons. You see there is in this galaxy a body of Cylons that don't want a war with the Colonials and never actually did. We only represent a third of the total Cylon population of the galaxy." I looked at Edmondson and she was gaping at me. Skull's eyes were as wide as hockey pucks. I knew they guessed by my use of the word, "we".

Smiling at them I looked them in the eyes and said, "I already talked to Doctor Baltar. Gaius caved quicker than you two. It seems he knew one of my sisters in John Cavil's faction before the fall of the Twelve Worlds. Sadly if you people hadn't attacked Earth back in October of 2013, well we'd be more open to allowing your survivors into Earth space. However we will let you settle here to rest and recuperate." I picked up the coffee I brought in with me and drank it as they digested what I just said.

Now I was going to let them know the whole truth, "A few years after the end of the Cylon War of Independence we had a split over the placing of inhibitors on our mechanical models by John Cavil. He had also killed our parents the five that created us from genetic material they saved from the population of their Earth, a world they named for the real Earth. We who followed Jacob Cavil ran coreward from Cylon space. Now we didn't cross the Armistice Line but skirted it and Colonial Space."

"Like our kindred we had a plan. We'd search for the world that our ancestors failed to find. We found Earth. I was place upon Earth as an observer. Jacob's plan for this infiltration was to have us inserted into their culture as juveniles and youths. My first memory of Earth was waking up in a hospital in Kansas City, Kansas. I was told that I had been the only one of my family to survive an automobile accident on a rural road. There was a wreck between a station wagon and a semi-tractor-trailer rig on a county highway in Wyandotte County in Kansas at the time. You see Jacob staged the accident using some of our former physical bodies so there'd be physical evidence for the forensic teams and accident investigators."

I took another sip of my coffee and continued as they now were paying me rapt attention, "I was healed in the hospital and the Earthers didn't even know I was a Cylon and not a teenaged young woman who was the sole survivor of her family."

_**Camp Thermopylae, Hoth 30 December 2014 CE/ YR 1998**_

The weeks went by and the 137th DBCT (Drop Brigade Combat Team) was assigned as the main garrison of the region of Hoth we claimed for Earth. The 242nd Engineer Company was assigned to build the settlement for the Colonial refugees. Forty-thousand plus civilians and around 3000 military survived the destruction of the United Colonies of Kobol. We had to build a city to house these survivors. Also we expanded our military base on planet as we needed barracks for the surviving Colonial military personnel. Now the UNSC and UEG decided that the surviving Colonial Fleet and Marine Corps personnel, still held as prisoners of war were to be recruited for personnel to staff the growing UNSC Armed Forces.

My company of Spartans was currently tasked for supporting the defense of Hoth against possible attack by John Cavil's faction of the Cylon Collective. The Free Cylon Collective had already been merged with the UEG and UNSC. So in the Third Space Combat Group we had the Second Deep Space Carrier Wing, and the Fourth Basestar Wing. We had Twelfth Centurion Regiment, the 137th DBCT, the 34th ODST Battalion and the 23rd Spartan Company.

The 23rd Spartan Company was my command that was a mix of Eighty-four Spartan II, Spartan III, Spartan IV, and Spartan Vs. I was one of the Spartan Vs. We were the volunteers taken in after the UNSC liberated our Earth from the Colonials. I had shown my talent at tactics and command so I was assigned as the 23rd's commanding officer with Spartan II Kelly-087 as my First Sergeant. Now since the Spartan Vs were taken from volunteers into the ODST program from Earth's armed forces we had members from the armies, navies, air forces, and marine corpses of the planet. My executive officer is a Spartan V and a former SAS operative Lieutenant Simon "Ghost" Riley. He was promoted to Captain. Ghost brought with him former US Army Ranger Sergeant Gary "Roach" Sanderson. Roach was promoted to Staff Sergeant and is the Platoon Sergeant of my Third Platoon.

_**Eastern Frontier New Sparta Colony, Hoth 30 December 2015 CE/ YR 1999**_

The 23rd was divided into a four man command team and four twenty man platoons. Sergeant Faith Lehane found herself as Squad Leader of Third Squad Third Platoon 23rd Spartan Company. Faith had enlisted on the day of the Invasion at an armory in Cleveland, Ohio. She went through a rather rudimentary basic training before being sent into action against the Colonials. After the Liberation of Earth and the formation of the United Earth Government and the reconstitution of the United Nations Space Command Armed Forces she found herself going through Orbital Drop Shock Troop training at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. After completing training with the Second ODST Training Brigade she was tested and accepted into the Spartan V program. Her Slayer abilities seemed to be behind her being able not only to pass ODST School, but also the Spartan V program's training and augmentation.

Now here on Hoth in command of Third Squad Third Platoon 23rd Spartan Company Sergeant Faith "Dark Slayer" Lehane was so far away from the mean streets of South Boston where she grew up that she couldn't believe her good fortune. Her Assistant Squad Leader was Alexander "Xander" Lavelle Harris also a Sergeant. Xander had found himself fighting the Colonials in the Congo Basin and Rain Forest in Central Africa. He was later after being healed and his eye replaced by the UNSC Medical Corps on the UNSC Infinity after being medi-evacced from the jungles of Africa to the Infinity. He had been wounded by a Colonial mortar round on that last day and Spartan II Michael-008 saw that Xander had a natural talent for combat and tactics plus the will to fight for what's right no matter the consequences.

"So Boytoy, how'd you become a Spartan?" SGT Faith Lehane said as she and Xander were on patrol in the wilderness on the eastern frontier of the colony of New Sparta on the planet Hoth with their squad. Team One was SGT Lehane's and Team Two was SGT Harris'. Each team had three Spartans counting the Team Leader. Team Leader Team One was always the Squad Leader and Team Two's was always the Assistant Squad Leader.

Xander looked around scanning the terrain around them on the HUD within his helmet and he temporarily flashed back to the Invasion and the resistance to it. He then in a slightly dark tone said, "I saw a village in the Congo get massacred by some Colonial Razors during the first week of the War and began to help the locals to resist. To hell with Buffy's restriction on killing humans, in the War I saw just how cruel and evil humanity could be to his brothers and sisters. I lost two potentials to Colonial rape gangs. One was made up of ordinary Marines, but the other was a squad of Colonial Marine Corps Razor Commandoes lead by a Lieutenant Alastair Thorne." There was certain viciousness as he spoke that man's name.

"Lieutenant Thorne somehow managed to slip through the net to catch War Criminals and was repatriated to the Colonies." Xander sounded upset over that, but he continued, "Then I learned that two other repatriated Colonial Officers gave him the justice he deserved nearly a year ago. I was over in New Caprica City; you know the capital of the colony of New Caprica. Anyways I met up with former Colonial Fleet Chief Petty Officer Galen Tyrol and shared Ambrosia with him in a bar on the main square." Xander smiled then as he recalled the drinks he shared with a fellow veteran of the Earth-Colonial War, "Chief Tyrol told me of how he and Lieutenant Karl Agathon killed Thorne when he and a new Rape Squad tried to have their way with Agathon's Cylon girlfriend. Seems back on Caprica shortly after Cavil's faction glassed the Colonies well nearly all of them except Caprica, Helo, that's Lieutenant Agathon's callsign, found himself a Cylon who passed herself off as his pilot Sharon Valerii. But that Eight was actually a different Sharon and was assigned to get this, fall in love with him and to get him to do the same with her."

Faith looked at Xander with his faceplate reflecting in hers and said, "Ew that's creepy, not as creepy as Buffy's old fascination with Angle or Spike, but creepy none the less." Xander nodded and returned to scanning his sector of their patrol route.

"Well it seems that Ms. Sharon got Helo to do the horizontal tango with her more than once, but it seems that the first time was a charm. Ms. Sharon got knocked up by Helo. Anyways Admiral Cain, another asswipe that shouldn't have been repatriated mind you, assigned Thorne to do one of his special interrogations on Ms. Sharon. Some of his team of Razors was sharing homemade hooch with Chief Tyrol's Deck Gang and some Galactica Pilots when one of those poor excuses for men said something about what Thorne was going to do with Sharon." Xander scanned his head from behind his right shoulder back toward his front and left overlapping Faith's sector. The conversation was in a low tone and on a secure channel the two of them used to discuss plans and other issues.

"What happened next Xander?" Faith asked as she scanned from her front right to just over her left shoulder. There was a scream in the air like the banshee wail of jet engines and both Xander and Faith looked up to see C shaped fighter craft streaking overhead. "Fuck Xan-Man we've got to report this to Command!" Faith yelled as she switched to the company push. "This is Blue Two Three to Sierra Six spot report, over!" Faith instantly switched from the banter she was having with Xander over the female Cylon that the Colonial Fleet Aviator had brought with him from the ruins of Caprica two years ago or so.

"Blue Two Three, Sierra Seven send report, over," said the voice of Kelly-087 over the company's tactical radio frequency.

"Possible Cylon Raiders heading toward New Caprica City. Squadron strength, looked to be on an attack vector, how copy, over?" Faith said as she checked the load on her newly issued M5A1 Assault Carbine. The M5A1 recently replaced the SCAR, ACR, and M4 series of carbines within the UNSC's special operations units starting with the Spartans and ODSTs. With the full integration of the Reconstituted Colonial Fleet and Colonial Marine Corps into the UNSC Armed Forces last year the Marines Mk VII assault carbines were replaced by the older M5 though units of the UNSC Marine Corps and Army were now getting the M5A1 and other UNSC based small arms to replace the weapons issued to them when they were units in their respective national services. Not trusting of the former Colonial Armed Forces members yet the refitting of those units was going slower than it was for the units that were incorporated into the UNSC Armed Forces from the national armed forces.

"Roger, Red Two Three, any other activity sighted, over?" Kelly-087 asked businesslike.

"Roger, Sierra Seven, we've spotted five more squadrons passing over and now there are boxy landing ships passing over two squadrons in strength, possible landing operations taking place. How copy, over?" Faith said as she, Xander and their squad of Spartans took stock of the possible invasion. The squad didn't have any SAMs, but they did have some M136A2 AT-4 LAWs. They weren't good substitutes for shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles, but in a pinch if the enemy aircraft were low enough they work. The trouble was they only had four of the launchers and there were too many targets.

_**Colonial Enclave New Caprica City, New Caprica Colony, Hoth**_

Laura Roslin was in the office of the multi-unit prefabricated school complex of New Caprica City. She was going over teacher assignments for the classes for the coming second semester. The former President of the Twelve Colonies was now the Secretary of Education for New Caprica Colony and Principle for the New Caprica Public School. NCPS was a K through Twelve School with a secondary campus that had New Caprica Technical College for the education of adults and older teens in skilled trades so that New Caprica Colony would have a base of skilled artisans and craftsmen to lead the population forward in the recovery.

NCTS was run by former Colonial Fleet Chief Petty Officer Galen Tyrol and he was busy with a class on generator maintenance in one of the prefabricated shops that served as the class rooms. "What do we do about clogged fuel filters Charley?" Tyrol asked looking at an eighteen year old boy that had until settling on Hoth served as a rifleman in the CMC. Before Charlie could answer there was the familiar banshee wail of Cylon Raider engines overhead. Chief Tyrol walked out of the overhead bay door of the shop and looked up into the skies overhead. His face was crossed with a look of dread as he dropped the wrench he was about to use to dismantle the filter system of the portable tylium generator he was using for an instructional aid. "Frak, Charlie get your carbine and join your squad!" Chief Petty Officer Tyrol New Caprica Colony Naval National Guard ordered as he abruptly turned around and ran back into the shop bay toward the office. "Everyone, who's in the Guard, head to your lockers, grab your guns and head toward your units' rally points!"

Chief Tyrol once he rushed into his office, picked up the phone on his desk's handset, and dialed a number. He waited for the party at the other end to pick up. He was watching out the window of his office through the bay to the outside. In the skies outside he saw hundreds of Cylon Raiders circling around. "Where are the Longswords, Starfighters, and Vipers?" he asked himself as he waited for the person on the other end of the line to answer.

_**Bridge, UNCS Hammond Deep Space Carrier 304-4**_

Rear Admiral Upper Half Samantha Carter looked out the main view port and saw with a sense of horror and dread as twenty starfish shaped starships popped into existence within a 100000 kilometers of her position. "Marks put the fleet on Defcon One now!" she ordered as she sat up straighter in the Command Chair. She then turned to Commander Jenifer Hailey, "Striker get to your fighter and launch all F302s!" Both officers responded with "Aye" and went about carrying out her orders. "Marks charge up the PPCs, Railguns, and arm tubes one through eight with Mark VIII anti-ship missiles!"

Commander Kevin Marks UNSC Navy former Lieutenant Colonel USAF looked worked his station relaying Rear Adm UH Carter's orders. "All stations report ready for combat sir!" he replied back. "Shields are raised, missile tubes loaded with Mark Eights and conventional anti-ship missiles, PPCs are charged and ready to fire, Railguns are charged and ready!"

Carter sat back in the Commander's Chair and called up the holographic tactical HUD. The red starfish shaped dots showed the position of the enemy fleet. The blue ship shapes showed the UNSC Galactica, the UNSC Pegasus, the UNSC Apollo, the UNSC Hammond, the UNSC Ares, the UNSC Thor, and the UNSC Odin. The Apollo, Hammond, Ares, Thor, and Odin were all Daedalus-Class Deep Space Carriers. The Galactica was a former Colonial Jupiter-Class Battlestar and the Pegasus was a former Colonial Mercury-Class Battlestar


End file.
